Betwixt and Between
by forevermagik13
Summary: What are Sora and the gang are doing after the final defeat of Xehanort? There are a lot of Heartless and Nobodies milling about. And there's some angry old 'friends' wanting some revenge. Sequel to "All the Pieces Lie Where They Fell."
1. Sanctuary

**Author's Note: **Oh my gosh! Hi! So guess what! Sequel time! For those of you who have been reading for a while, welcome to the sequel to "All the Pieces Lie Where They Fell" (from here on out, AtP). This pretty much picks up mere days after the other one lets off. Though, after that, time gets a little timey-whimey because there are a lot of different story lines to cover. I'm dealing with a lot of charries here.

For those of you who are new, I suggest you go read AtP, because there are things that happen here that will make SO MUCH more sense if you read that one first. However, I suppose you probably can just pick this one up and figure it out as you go along if you truly wish.

Either way, check out my profile. It has links to both my deviantArt account and my blog on Posterous. Both of which contain lots of information regarding this epic Kingdom Hearts fanfic.

For those of you who are familiar with my characters, you will enjoy knowing that Riku and Namine wrote this chapter by themselves. Originally, my first chapter involved Riku and Terra talking to each other about their dabbles in darkness. Then Namine and Riku were like "nope, write this." So I did. And I'm in love with it. You'll still get to read the dabbles in darkness chapter-just, next chapter.

For those of you following 'Some Things You Just Can't Escape', this actually takes place BEFORE Kairi, Namine and Xion go to the parallel universe. Yeah, I know. Sorry. It just happened like that.

And now, without further ado, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"What? What did I say?"<p>

xx

Namine was only mostly asleep. It was so early it wasn't even light yet. However, she wasn't particularly tired anymore. Perhaps she didn't particularly need sleep… She wasn't too sure. She wanted to be able to draw, but they never got a chance to get her another sketchbook last night after everything that had gone on.

Something tapped at her window. It didn't take her long to throw back the covers and leap to the window. She opened the window and looked at the odd chunk of Blizzard that had been the culprit of the tapping.

Namine looked down to see Riku casually guiding the Blizzard chunk with his Keyblade.

"Morning!" he said.

She grinned. "Good morning! What are you doing down there?"

"Waking you up, what's it look like?"

She laughed. "Is there any particular reason why you're waking me up before the sun's even up yet?"

"I want to show you something on the other island," he said, grinning. "You should get dressed and come down."

Not even questioning, Namine nodded and started to head back into the room.

"Oh, and bring pencils."

"To draw on _what_?" she asked, poking her head back out the window again.

Riku pulled a sketchbook out from behind his back. He smiled.

"When did you have time to get that? No place is open at this hour!"

"It's not nighttime everywhere," he said with a shrug. "Twilight Town was just opening up shop when I got there. This big enough?"

"Yes, it's perfect, thank you!"

"Told you I'd get you one."

"Okay, I'll be right down!"

He nodded and started to head around to the front of the house. Meanwhile, Namine opened the dresser that Kairi's parents had been so nice to buy her, (along with the bed and the desk and the bedside table.) She pulled out a lightweight, white sundress that Kairi had lent her. They hadn't had time to go out and buy either her or Xion new clothes yet. Roxas somehow seemed to be getting by with things of Sora's. Go figure.

She slid out of her nightgown (that she had also borrowed from Kairi) and into the sundress. She pulled on her sandals and smoothed down her hair. The last thing she did was grab a handful of pencils off the desk before making her way down the stairs and letting herself out the front door.

Riku was nonchalantly leaning against the picket-fence. He handed her the sketchbook as she approached him.

"Thank you!" she said again, hugging him.

He hugged her back. "No problem. Shall we go?"

"What is it that you want to show me?"

"You'll see, just come along."

He grabbed her hand and led her down to the dock. He motioned for her to get into a boat and he untied it from its post. Then the two of them rowed over to the other island. Namine was itching to start sketching, but she wasn't sure if some other image would present itself to her. She didn't like getting interrupted in the middle of a drawing.

The anticipation of what Riku was going to show her was killing her. When he saw her anxiousness he laughed.

It didn't take them very long to get to the other island. Riku tethered the boat down and helped Namine out. He then led her to the Paopu tree. It was just beginning to get light. He sat down on the tree and motioned for her to sit down next to him. Namine cocked her head to one side, slightly confused.

"Don't we usually sit facing the other direction?" she asked.

"Not this morning we're not," he replied.

She sat down.

"Remember how you asked me yesterday why I was over here so early for no apparent reason?"

She nodded.

He pointed at the horizon.

"That is why."

As if he had perfect timing (which, he probably did), the sun began to rise over the waves. The greyish morning was instantly bathed in pinks and purples. Namine gasped. Riku put his arms around her.

"It's so beautiful," she murmured.

"I like to come here and watch it for that very reason."

"I've never seen a sunrise before!"

He smiled. "Well, now you have."

She opened up her sketchbook and selected a few pencils. Without even looking down at the paper, she began to draw the image of the sunrise presented to her. Her hands flew across the page, capturing the colorful beauty.

"It amazes me that you don't even look down," Riku mused.

"I don't want to miss a moment of this."

He laughed a little.

"I'm glad you enjoy it," he said.

"Do you want to know what the best part is?" she asked, turning away from the rising sun for the first time to look at him.

"What?"

"Spending it with you."

He smiled.

xx

Namine drew a couple of pictures as the sun rose. Then she closed the book and watched the remainder of the sunrise in silence with Riku. The only sounds were the lapping of waves against the rock-face and their steady breathing.

When the pinks and purples faded into the crystal blues that Destiny Islands was normally covered with, Riku slid off the tree and stretched.

"There's one more thing I want to show you before anyone else comes over here," he said.

"Yes?" she asked, sliding off the tree as well.

"Follow me."

Once again, Namine found herself being led by Riku. They walked side-by-side across the island, climbing through the bushes and whatnot that littered the island. They appeared to be walking toward a dead-end. Namine was about to mention this when Riku moved some branches aside, revealing a cave of sorts.

"I had wondered how much this would have grown over the years," he mused, mostly to himself, though Namine could still hear him.

The two of them walked in. Namine noticed drawings along nearly all of the rocks. There was a door, or something that used to be a door, in one of the corners. She recognized this place. Riku began walking around, looking at all the old drawings. Namine stood in the middle of the Secret Place, admiring the sights.

"Well, that's new," Riku said, surprised.

"What is?" she asked, going over to where he was.

He pointed at one of the childish drawings. The two people in the drawing were obviously Sora and Kairi, though Sora looked to be better drawn than Kairi. If Namine had still been sharing a heart with Kairi, she probably would have been presented with a memory of this being etched. However, she still knew that Sora had drawn an image of Kairi, and that Kairi had drawn the image of Sora.

The most intriguing part of the image, however, was the Paopu fruits. They looked like they had been added in later.

"Sora added the one given to Kairi before we planned to set sail on the raft," Riku said, pointing to the fruit. "I don't know when the other one was drawn."

"Kairi added that one," Namine said. "It was after the Islands were restored."

"How do you know?"

"Vague memory of Kairi thinking about it," Namine replied, shrugging.

"How does that even work?" Riku asked.

"I'm not entirely sure," Namine said, laughing. "However, she was the one to add it."

"I wonder if Sora knows," Riku mused.

"He doesn't, not unless he's been in here since. She hasn't told him about it."

"He might have been," Riku said with a shrug. "He walked all over this place when we got back last time."

"Kairi hasn't been here since she forgot about Sora," Namine said, slowly.

Riku winced. "Can we not think about that, please?"

Namine looked up at him. "Yeah, sure."

She ran her hand over the two Paopu fruits and slowly made her way to a rock that had yet to be drawn on.

"May I?" she asked, picking up a rock to draw with.

"Go for it," Riku said.

She smiled and sat down. Riku held her sketchbook and pencils so they wouldn't get dirty from the ground. As she drew, he reminisced on the pictures that he, Sora and Kairi had drawn over the years.

xx

"It doesn't look too out of place, does it?" Namine asked after a while.

Riku looked over at her newly drawn picture. It was a simple image, though easily distinguishable. It was her and him, holding hands. She held her sketchbook, he held his Keyblade.

"Am I protecting you from something?" he asked.

She shrugged. "It just seemed right to add that in."

"Well, regardless, the image is wonderful."

"It doesn't look out of place?"

"Nothing can look out of place in here," he responded.

She grinned and dusted herself off.

"Anything else you'd like to show me?"

"No, I think that was all," he said.

"Darn, I was hoping for more surprises!"

"I can't give you all of them in one day!"

"Oh, so you _do _have more surprises?"

"I wasn't saying that… though, I'm sure I could come up with more places and things to show you, considering all the worlds I've seen."

She grinned.

He set her sketchbook and pencils down on a flat rock so he could take her hands in his.

"It's odd to think about," he said.

"What is?"

"All the things that you haven't seen."

"Oh, well, I know about a lot of things, because I see them when I draw them."

"But this is different," he said. "There are things that you've never really experienced. I first noticed it when you took off your shoes and stepped barefoot in the sand; when I coaxed you into the ocean for the first time for the other day. I noticed it again when you said you'd never seen a sunset in real life. And just this morning, you said you'd never seen a sunrise. Namine, there is so much you haven't seen! And I want to show it all to you."

She blushed and looked down at her feet.

"If you show me one new thing every day," she said quietly. "I think I will live a very happy life."

"Then I will show you one new thing every day. Whether it be here on the Islands, or some other world you have yet to truly experience."

"Is that… a promise?" she asked, her voice catching in her throat.

"Yes."

She began to cry.

"What?" he asked, instantly alarmed. "What did I say?"

"You are the first person to promise me something to my face, without me having to screw with your memories first."

"Oh, Namine…" he said, holding her to him. "Remember what I said about making a thousand more happy memories with you to make up for all the horrible ones you have from Castle Oblivion?"

She nodded, her cheeks rubbing up against his chest.

"That was a promise, too."

She smiled.

"Thank you."

He kissed her forehead.

"Of course."

"Do you think we could go flying?" she asked, pulling away enough to look up at him.

"Out of all the things to ask for," he said, incredulous.

"It seemed like so much fun!" she said, her smile growing hopefully.

"Sure, we can go to Neverland and fly."

She hugged him excitedly.


	2. A Twinkle in the Sky

**Author's Note: **Calling all Namiku lovers! You should go check out a wonderful fic by rarmaster called 'Falling to Pieces'. Namiku galore! Well, they're not actually together yet, but it'll happen. Anyway, I am really pleased with the outcome of the first chapter and I'm glad that you all enjoyed it! I'm not going to be answering any questions as of this point, because I'm hoping that a good many of them will be answered in the coming chapters. But, I suppose I could put an applicable-to-this-fic Q and A up on my blog as a blog post if you guys wanted to submit questions. I could do that after chapter... 5 or so? Sound good? But only if you submit questions.

I'm also planning on putting commentary on just about every chapter I post up on the blog. The one for this chapter will be up before the night's out I would say.

Erm, was there anything else? Oh! I got offered an internship at Disney World in Florida! I'll be there from January to August. Yes, it will impede on my writing time some. But, if we're lucky, I'll have this done by then :P Depends on how many lovely plot arcs my charries want to continue adding.

Without further ado, the next chapter!

* * *

><p>"Don't blame me when you lose."<p>

xx

Terra sat on the beach. His eyes were closed as he listened to the calming sound of the waves. He, Aqua and Ven would be leaving these peaceful islands soon. He wanted to make sure the darkness was in check. Aqua said they had a place to visit. Ven was just happy to come in general.

A small part of him just considered staying here. However, that would be impractical. Destiny Islands already had two Masters on it. Sora had decided to take on an apprentice. And between him and Riku, Roxas and Xion were going to be trained as well.

Besides, Terra was going to stay with his friends. And Aqua was planning on going places.

He heard footsteps and looked up. Riku had seen fit to join him.

"Morning," Terra said.

Riku nodded. "Morning."

"These waves remind me of someplace," Terra said. "I just close my eyes and I'm reminded of… well, I can't really remember where."

"The Dark Margin," Riku answered.

"Yeah, that's the place. How'd you know?"

"I made the same connection."

"It's peaceful here."

"It is."

"What happened to your arm?" Terra asked.

Riku laughed and stretched out his left arm. He had bandages surrounding his left hand and wrist, as well as one up closer to his shoulder.

"Well, I broke the wrist the first time when Roxas took a Keyblade to it. Then Xaldin drove a lance through it. Then Xigbar got me with a bullet."

"Darkness?"

Riku nodded.

Terra winced. "I feel like I should apologize…"

"Don't."

"But I…"

"Don't. You were being controlled. I know what that's like."

"You do?"

"Ansem got to me. You wouldn't have known because your heart resided in Xemnas' at that time."

"Ah."

"Anyway, you don't have to apologize, or try and explain it to me. I know."

"Cloud was the same way."

Riku looked over at Terra.

"Really now?"

Terra nodded.

"I'll have to go talk to him then," Riku said.

"Apparently, he almost killed Aerith."

Riku winced.

"What is it about Aerith that brings about that reaction?" Terra wondered. "I don't really know the girl all that well—but I do know she is just _full _of light."

Riku nodded.

"There's just something about her, when you think about her being in danger, you cringe," Riku said.

"Yeah. Aerith doesn't seem to hold it against him though."

"I don't think Aerith has the capacity to hold a grudge."

Terra laughed. "Ven's the same way."

"Not surprised. Sora's like that too."

"Do you think he got that from Ven, or he was already like that?"

"A bit of both I would say."

Terra nodded and looked back out into the ocean.

"What brings you here this early?" he asked.

"The sunrise," Riku replied. "I brought Namine here yesterday. She loved it. I didn't realize just how much I'd missed it… What about you?"

"Wanted to just sit and think," Terra replied, shrugging. "This seemed like the place to do it. Though, it's weird: _he _used to come here and think."

"Xehanort?" Riku asked.

Terra nodded grimly.

"Yeah, he was from this world. He was also the first one anyone ever noticed leave…"

"So you said," Terra said. "Many years ago."

Riku laughed just a little. "I did, didn't I?"

"You also said he was really strong," Terra said with a morbid laugh.

Riku made a face.

"So, I assume you protected the things that matter?" Terra asked, changing the subject.

Riku nodded. "Took me a bit to realize what that entailed, but I think I have it figured out."

Terra summoned his Keyblade symbolically. Ends of the Earth had seen better days. It looked a tad battered and beaten. Riku looked at it, curious.

"Aqua says it's because I didn't wield it for so many years," Terra said, explaining the cracks and missing pieces. "Hers isn't much better."

"I've seen hers though…"

"You saw our Master's," Terra said. "Aqua wielded his Keyblade in the Realm of Darkness after sacrificing her Keyblade and her Armor to save me. It then sat in a locked room down below Hollow Bastion for as long as this one was in the Keyblade Graveyard."

Riku nodded in understanding. He summoned his Keyblade.

"This used to be bent and crooked," he said. "But it has since taken on this form. Your Keyblade will probably repair itself."

"That's what Aqua was thinking."

"So when do you leave?" Riku asked.

"Either later today or tomorrow," Terra said. "Aqua says she has another promise to keep with someone."

"What was that promise?" Riku asked.

"A promise to a boy that she'd bring her friends the next time she visited."

"It's probably been a long time since she last visited."

Terra shrugged. "I don't think it matters to her. She's not one to break promises."

Riku laughed. "I know a few people like that."

"You're like that yourself," Terra said.

Riku smiled at the compliment.

"Terra!"

Both boys turned to see Ven running over to them.

"There you are!" he said, leaning on his knees, panting.

"Is something wrong?" Terra said.

"No, just trying to find you. You ready to go?"

"So early?"

"You're already up!"

Terra laughed and started to stand. "True."

Ven tossed a bag to Terra.

"You left it at the inn."

"Thanks for grabbing it."

"So I take it you're off, then?" Riku said, standing as well.

"Suppose so."

The three of them started walking to the little dock. Aqua was standing there, along with Kairi, Roxas and Axel. Kairi was examining a blue glass star.

"I made one of these for Sora," she said. "Did it work?"

Aqua looked at Terra and Ven walking up.

"I think it did," she said, smiling.

"Hey, if you ever need a double," Roxas said, extending his hand out for Ven to shake.

"I'll know who to call," Ven replied.

"See you guys around," Axel said. "You know you can stay here for cheap. Stupid discount for Keyblade wielders…"

The last comment was more of a mutter to himself.

"You do realize that it's a discount for anyone who happens to be Kairi's friend, right?" Aqua asked.

"What?" Axel asked, flatly.

Kairi grinned.

Aqua turned to Terra and Ven. "I know I said something about meeting up with someone, but I was wondering if you guys would be opposed to stopping at Master Yen Sid's first? I want to ask him about the Lanes Between."

"What are those?" Roxas asked.

"They're kind of like dark corridors, if I remember correctly," Axel said. "Not that I've ever used them, but I've heard of them."

Aqua nodded. "You have more control over them than you do a star shard, but you have to wear protection."

"We've all got Keyblade Armor," Ven said.

"Exactly."

"You also need a Keyblade," Axel said. "Keyblades are the only ones that open the Lanes _and _you have to use your Keyblade as a glider."

"I wouldn't use them then," Riku said.

"Why…" Roxas began. "Oh."

"Namine," Riku stated. "Plain and simple. I'll stick to star shards and Gummi Ships."

"And that's an honorable choice," Terra said.

"Well, anyway," Aqua said, pulling out a star shard. "We'll be seeing you around."

"Of course!" Kairi said.

"It was nice meeting all of you!" Ven said. "In person, that is."

Kairi and Roxas smiled. Riku nodded in his direction.

"Hey, I might just go with you guys if you're heading to Yen Sid's," Axel said. "He might be able to answer a question I've got about a corridor of light."

"Corridor of light?" Aqua said. "There's no such thing."

"That's what I thought until I saw one the other day."

"Well, you're welcome to come along," Aqua said. "I don't see a problem with it. But how will you get back?"

"Easy, I'll dark corridor…"

Kairi and Riku were frowning at him.

"…myself to Castle Oblivion and pick up some extra star shards for us."

Riku still frowned, but Axel could ignore that.

"We'll be sure to drop by sometime soon," Aqua said, putting a hand on Ven's shoulder.

"She means it!" Ven said, grabbing onto Terra's arm.

Axel put a hand on Ven's shoulder and saluted nonchalantly.

"Don't hurt yourself!" Kairi said.

"I make no promises, got it memorized?"

She sighed.

"He'll be fine," Roxas told her.

She shook her head. "I know, but it's the principal of the manner."

The star shard activated and the four of them zipped off.

After a moment's silence, Kairi looked over at Riku.

"Race you!"

Riku looked over at her and raised an eyebrow. "You do realize that I will beat you."

She shrugged. "Yeah, I know. But that doesn't mean I shouldn't strive to get better."

"Okay, fine. The usual route?"

She nodded.

He turned to Roxas. "Will you count us off?"

"How, exactly?" asked a confused Roxas.

"Just count down from three, then say go," Kairi said.

"Okay, three…"

Kairi and Riku got ready.

"Two…"

"Don't blame me when you lose," Riku muttered.

"One…"

She laughed.

"Go!"

Kairi and Riku took off along the beach. It didn't take too long for Riku to pull ahead of her, but that didn't stop her from trying to keep up. Despite it having been years since they had done this, they both still knew the route. Not surprisingly, Riku won. Kairi came around not too long after. Roxas congratulated them both out of courtesy.

"See, told you I'd win," Riku said.

"I knew you would, I just wanted to see how much I could keep up."

"Valid. You didn't do too bad."

Kairi smiled. "I'll catch up with you guys, just you wait!"

Riku raised an eyebrow at the determination, but said nothing.


	3. Sora and Riku

**Author's Note: **Taking a break from my ridiculously long research paper to post this chapter. I have a suggestion for you after you are done reading this chapter. Go read the latest two chapters of 'Can't Escape' if you haven't already. This chapter takes place at the same time as the first one and the chapter that I will upload next takes place at the same time as the second one. Woot! Yay for being parallel again! Also yay for sending random groups of people out to exterminate enemies!

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Would someone like to explain this?"<p>

xx

"So, do you think it'll work?" Sora asked.

"What'll work?" Riku replied.

"Using Destiny Islands as a base while we just go out to other worlds to keep the balance?"

"I don't see why it won't. The Organization did a pretty good job of it. Though, they were keeping a different sort of balance."

"The Organization had thirteen people though!"

"Not after Castle Oblivion. They only had eight. No, sorry, nine. Xion. Well, wait, Xemnas never left The World that Never Was for anything besides his own business. So, kind of eight." Riku waffled back and forth between the numbers as he thought.

Sora counted on his fingers. "There's six of us. Seven if you include Axel, but he still hasn't given a straight answer as to if he's staying around to help us or not."

"There's also Terra, Aqua and Ven out there helping. And the King, and Leon, and…"

"So, you're saying it'll work?"

"I'm saying it _should _work. We've got four star shards between us all, as well as a lot of manpower. I think we can handle it."

"You just don't want Namine to be on the road all the time," Sora teased.

"I never said that."

"There's gotta be _some _reason why you want to be based out of Destiny Islands though! Roxas and Xion I get, they're used to being based out of The World that Never Was. But you? You _always _wanted to leave."

Riku shrugged. "Not so much anymore."

Sora looked up at the long flight of stairs before them. "Well, ready?" he asked.

Riku nodded. "When aren't I?"

Sora rolled his eyes and started up the tower, Riku right alongside him.

"Took you guys long enough!" Leon said as they reached the top.

He was leaning against the wall, his arms folded across his chest and a bored expression on his face. Across from him was a woman mimicking his motions. She had long dark hair and was dressed primarily in blue.

Sora cocked his head to one side at the sight of her.

"We came as soon as we got the message," Riku said. "And star shards are pretty quick."

Leon shrugged. "Perhaps I'm just spoiled with my airship."

"What?" Sora asked.

"It's basically a Gummi Ship that's been amplified with magic several times over. I don't even let Cid touch it."

Sora's jaw dropped.

"He wouldn't have it if it weren't for me," the woman said, speaking for the first time. She pulled away from the wall, revealing very large, white wings. "I'm Rinoa, by the way. Forgive Squall, he's not usually one for introducing people."

Riku shook her extended hand. Sora did so as well.

"I thought you told people that you didn't want to…" he began.

Leon quieted him with a gesture of "let it be."

Sora looked over at Rinoa and figured that she was the kind of person that would call Leon whatever she felt like calling him, regardless of what he asked. In fact, if he remembered correctly, Yuffie had said something about Rinoa calling him 'Squally.' If Yuffie was right, Rinoa was also Leon's girlfriend.

"Shall we go in, then?" Rinoa asked, dragging Sora from his thoughts. "I'm sure Master Yen Sid has been waiting long enough. It wouldn't do to keep him waiting longer."

Without saying a word, Leon reached over and knocked on the door to the side of him.

"Enter."

The four of them walked in.

"Glad you four could join us," Yen Sid said. "I did not know you would be accompanying Mister Leonheart, Miss Heartily."

Rinoa curtseyed a little. "I was in town, and I wouldn't want to pass an opportunity to meet with one of the finest sorcerers around."

Yen Sid bowed his head at the compliment. "We shall catch up on how your studies are doing later, Miss Heartily. If you will pardon me, I must speak with the others."

She gestured that he go on ahead.

"Sora, Riku, Mis—"

"Leon, please."

"Very well," Yen Sid said, frowning at the interruption. Leon didn't seem to care. "As I am sure you three are aware," Yen Sid continued. "The worlds are experiencing fluctuations in their balances. There is increased activity of the lesser Nobodies in The World That Never Was as well as increased Heartless activity in Hollow Bastion."

"You don't have to tell me," Leon muttered.

"And that is just the beginning," Yen Sid said, ignoring the interruption this time. "In addition, there are other worlds that still have open Keyholes. However!" He held up a hand. "Aqua, Terra and Ventus have agreed to take on that responsibility. I just thought it appropriate to let you know. Regardless, even in worlds that have sealed Keyholes, there are problems with Heartless and Nobodies alike, among other enemies I am sure."

"Malboros," Rinoa muttered, making a disgusted face. "_Blech_."

"What exactly do you need us to do?" Riku asked.

"Go to those worlds that are in need of restoring," Yen Sid said. "I think you can figure out the rest."

"You mentioned Hollow Bastion and The World That Never Was," Sora said. "But how are we to know the other worlds without travelling to each one?"

"That's where we come in," Leon said. "Cid's expanding his computer to track the levels of Heartless and Nobodies in worlds outside of Hollow Bastion. So long as you keep in touch with us, we'll be able to tell you what's out of place where."

"Sounds simple enough," Riku said. "I assume we start as soon as possible?"

"Hollow Bastion's doing okay at the moment," Leon said. "The World That Never Was could use some cleanup of Dusks and Creepers I hear."

"So long as there's no Dancers, I'm good," Sora said, cracking his knuckles. "I've been wanting to test out Drive Forms again, anyway."

"Ah! You bring up a good point," Yen Sid said. "When it comes to your Drive Forms, you will notice that certain friends will get you certain forms and only those certain friends will be able to help you achieve them."

Sora nodded. "Right, got it."

"Now, on the note of apprentices," Yen Sid said.

"I'm taking on Kairi!" Sora said, raising his hand as he did so.

Rinoa stifled laughter and Leon covered his face with a hand.

"Very well," Yen Sid said, nodding. "Aqua has agreed to take on both Terra and Ventus. What about you, Riku?"

"I was figuring I'd keep an eye on Roxas and Xion both," Riku replied. "We all pretty much figured we'd be training each other."

"A wise decision."

"Anything else you'd like to discuss, Master Yen Sid?" Sora asked.

"Not at the precise moment. I will call you when something comes up. The stars keep me informed of the changes in the fates."

Both boys saluted and made their way out, Rinoa and Leon not far behind.

"Shall we go to The World That Never Was, then?" Riku asked.

"Sure, but we should stop by Destiny Islands first and see if anyone else wants to come."

"Didn't Kairi mention that she was taking Namine and Xion out to get new clothes?" Riku asked.

"Oh, so not them, then."

"We could still see if Roxas or Axel wanted to help though."

"We should help them, Squall," Rinoa said quietly.

"We still have Hollow Bastion to…"

"What's one afternoon? Cloud and Tifa are there, so are Quistis and Zell. I'm sure Cid'll understand."

"No he won't," Leon said.

"I'll make him understand," Rinoa said stubbornly.

"I'm not winning this argument, am I?" Leon asked.

Rinoa shook her head.

Sora laughed. Even Riku smiled a little.

"Fine," Leon said, sighing.

"Would you still like your friends Roxas and Axel to help, though?" Rinoa asked, looking at Sora and Riku.

"The more help we get, the faster the job will go," Riku reasoned.

"Makes sense. I'll summon them."

"You'll what?" Sora asked.

Rinoa, however, didn't answer. She'd closed her eyes, obviously concentrating on something. She tossed two white feathers in the air and they disappeared. There was a brief white glow that surrounded her, then it disappeared as well.

Riku raised his eyebrows, Sora had to hastily close his jaw given the look that Leon was giving him.

Rinoa opened her eyes and looked at Leon. "We should hurry and get there if we want to beat them."

"What just happened?" Sora asked.

"I sent for Axel and Roxas. They'll join us in The World That Never Was."

"How…?"

"She's a Sorceress, shall we leave it at that?" Leon asked.

Sora grumbled. Riku didn't look too pleased either, but didn't voice a complaint.

"I'll explain on the way," Rinoa said, heading down the stairs. "Come on!"

Rinoa did explain along the way. After Sora got done gawking at how fast the Ragnarok could travel, she explained to the two of them just how many things she could do because she was a Sorceress while Leon drove the ship.

She told them about being able to chain-cast spells like Meteor and Holy without needing to use an ether or any other item that would replenish magic. She told them that some of her powers then entailed the ability to teleport, or to summon others through teleports to bring them where they needed to be. She used her own feathers as foci for doing so. She didn't even have to be where she was summoning people to.

"Aren't there drawbacks to such power?" Riku asked. "Certainly that much power could backfire immensely if not used correctly."

Rinoa nodded. "But that is what Squall's for. He promised to be my Knight. To protect me from others and myself."

Sora turned to look at Leon and he could see that Leon had the traces of a smile on his face. Sora found the whole idea to be rather romantic, but he didn't want to voice that thought in front of Riku.

Riku, meanwhile, was thinking of how perhaps Keyblade Wielders should have a guardian of sorts, to prevent them from getting too powerful and misusing that power.

Xehanort.

"Right, we're there," Leon said.

"Question, how is that even possible?" Sora asked. "I just remembered that The World that Never Was doesn't show up on a map."

"It doesn't," Leon said.

"Magic!" Rinoa added, putting a finger over her lips as if it were a big secret.

Sora and Riku decided it was best not to question further.

As soon as they were off the ship, they were bombarded by two things relatively simultaneously. The first was a large amount of Creepers and Dusks that seemed to be multiplying by the minute. The second of which was a very flustered-looking Axel, and a very confused-looking Roxas.

"Would someone like to explain this?" Axel asked, holding up one of the white feathers when he saw Sora and Riku.

Then he saw Rinoa and his jaw dropped.

"Watch it…" Leon cautioned.

Axel coughed and looked at his feet, scratching the back of his neck.

"Hello, who are you?" Roxas asked.

Rinoa cocked her head to one side. "Haven't I already met you?"

"'Fraid not. Must've been Ven that you met. My name's Roxas."

"Oh, are you two twins or something?"

"It's a complicated story…"

"Why don't you explain while we take care of these monsters?"

"Sure!" Roxas said, drawing his Keyblade.


	4. Another Side

**Author's Note: **So I was going to wait until tomorrow (today) evening to post this, however, then I realized that there is a high chance I won't be near my computer then, so, since I already have this written and betaed (thank you to my wonderful beta chickendip), that I'd post it now. (Forgive any spelling errors in my Author's note, I'm up really late (early) as I'm typing this.

Anyway, the important bit of news... Yes, I am running parallel to Can't Escape. However, Can't Escape is only running parallel to PARTS of Dead Inside. As far as Sora's story goes, we're even. Where Riku and Namine and Castle Oblivion are concerned, I'm ahead of her. Basically, Riku and Namine are in Hollow Bastion, they go back to CO for the raid, a few other things happen, THEN my charries show up in HB. If that's confusing, PM either me or her and we'll try and explain it. I may also just blog about it, once I get confirmation from her about what all I can talk about without spoiling stuff.

Regardless, this still runs parallel to the latest chapter in Can't Escape. Well, as parallel as you can with the time difference. Gah, timey whimey.

Other than that, if you haven't been keeping up with Can't Escape, I suggest you at least go read the latest two chapters. There's not a whole lot of stuff that'll confuse you if you haven't read the whole thing already. The link's on my page.

Erm... I think that's everything. Rar and I spent a good 30 minutes earlier today trying to figure this out. Yay for me getting confused and her characters adding stuff.

Not that I can say much, in the chapter I was writing today... well... Riku and Namine have turned it into 3 and a quarter. And they're not done. Yes, let me repeat that. It will be at least *4* chapters by the time I'm done with it. And I had just been thinking... "It'd be nice if they'd give me a chapter or two out of this..." Yeah, well, wish granted. And you're all going to both love and hate me when we get there.

Oh, Flightfoot, since your question won't be answered in an upcoming chapter... Ven met Rinoa in Hollow Bastion in chapter 5 of Before the Epilogue. He kept asking about her wings and powers. That's how they know each other.

Enough of me blabbing... Enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"Don't <em>do <em>that!"

xx

"You going to test out your drive forms?" Riku asked Sora as they started hacking through the Nobodies.

"Yeah, I'll do that now I suppose."

He concentrated for a minute, then frowned.

"Can't seem to get Valor…" he muttered. He concentrated again. "Nor Wisdom…"

"Why do I get the feeling that this is going to backfire any minute now?" Riku wondered, taking out a few Creepers with a well-placed Thundaga. "That was two attempts in a row…"

Just then, both Leon and Axel both disappeared. Riku looked over to see a shadowy-black Sora streaking through the Nobodies, batting and scratching away.

"Where'd Squall go?" Rinoa asked.

"Don't worry about it," Riku said, not liking the anxiousness in her voice. It wasn't worried-anxious, it was "I'm-going-to-kill-someone-if-something-isn't-done-soon-anxious." He very quickly decided that he did _not _want to be on Rinoa's bad side. And that was saying something.

"Sora's just gone and thrown himself into Anti-Form," Roxas said. "They'll be okay."

"Provided Sora doesn't hurt himself," Riku muttered.

"What do we do, then?" Rinoa asked, frowning.

"Make sure Sora doesn't hurt himself," Riku said, intervening as a bunch of Creepers awkwardly tried to sneak up on the not-paying-attention Sora.

"Combo?" Roxas asked, looking at Riku.

Riku nodded and extended a hand. Roxas took it and the two of them focused their power. A shield of light formed around them almost instantly. With a shout from both boys, the shield was pushed outwards, knocking nearly all of the Nobodies back several yards.

"Impressive," Rinoa said, sending her blaster edge at a Dusk that the expanding shield had missed.

About then, Sora phased out of Anti-Form.

"Make someone else disappear next time!" Axel grumbled.

"Sorry!" Sora called. "I don't really have much control of that."

He started hacking away at some nearby Dusks to build up his Drive counter again.

"Well, that was interesting," Leon muttered, taking his gunblade to the closest Creeper.

"Round of Eternal Session?" Riku asked, looking at Sora.

Sora nodded and the two of them began their combo.

Not to be outdone, Axel looked over at Roxas.

"Shall we show them what we've got?" he asked.

"I'm not sure what you're getting at…"

"Oh, come on, think of all the Heartless-killing days we had!"

Roxas' face lit up. "Oh! Sure!"

Axel encircled the nearest two-dozen or so Nobodies in a ring of fire. The ground began to take on a molten look. Roxas darted about the circle, bashing the Nobodies with plumes of light. Axel threw chakram after flaming chakram at the rest of them. Within a minute, all the Nobodies inside the circle were dead. Roxas slowed down, twirling Oblivion casually in satisfaction. Axel caught his chakrams and the fire died down.

"Not bad, partner!" Roxas called out.

Axel gave a mock bow.

"Okay, gonna try for Master Form again," Sora shouted. "I apologize if it backfires, though it _shouldn't_…"

There was a burst of light and Riku disappeared. Sora, however, was standing in golden clothes and wielding two Keyblades; his own, and Riku's.

"Sweet!" Sora exclaimed, working Way to Dawn into a spin. "By the way, nice combo, guys!"

Roxas and Axel grinned.

"Should we show them our combo?" Rinoa asked quietly, hovering by Leon.

"Let's wait," Leon said. "Wouldn't want to spoil their fun."

She laughed and sent her blaster edge spiraling about amongst some Creepers.

Sora captured a bunch of the Creepers into a whirlwind before killing them all with his blades. He ricocheted off a nearby building and came crashing down on some unsuspecting Dusks.

"Impressive," Axel mused, casually tossing a chakram about.

"You should see Final Form," Roxas told him. _"That's _impressive."

Axel wasn't entirely convinced, considering Sora had just cast about as much Thundagas as Larxene used to do back when she was particularly pissed off at somebody.

"And I thought _I _chain-casted," Rinoa laughed, casting several Thundagas of her own.

"Glad to see that worked," Riku said when Sora dropped out of Master Form.

"Yeah!" Sora said. "Now to test Final…"

"Need help getting your Gauge up?" Roxas asked.

"That'd be nice, yeah," Sora replied.

The two of them linked arms. They glowed white with light before each shooting off in a different direction, sending off pillars of blue-white light as they did so. Roxas seemed to have a better idea of how to direct the pillars of light, but Sora's still did a good bit of damage. As each of them performed this attack, they seemed to gain a second Keyblade apiece, the second one made entirely out of light.

"And the Nobodies just keep coming," Leon muttered, taking his blade through a few more.

"Gauge still isn't full enough for Final," Sora said when he and Roxas had finished their attack.

"Here," Rinoa said, casting a spell on Sora. "This should help."

Sora had gained an orange glow.

"What spell is _that_?" he asked.

"Aura, helps you activate Limits better and faster. Try out Final Form."

Sora nodded and concentrated. In a white flash of light Roxas disappeared and Sora was in Final Form, wielding Oathkeeper and Oblivion.

"Well, that's appropriate," Riku observed.

"I think it's time we finish this job," Sora said.

Rinoa grinned cast another couple of Auras. Riku charged up a Dark Aura, Axel lit up another circle of fire. Sora grinned and glided over to the nearest bunch of Nobodies. Then, without even touching the two Keyblades that he was currently wielding, he sent them after the unsuspecting Nobodies with gusto. Each enemy disappeared in light.

"Hey, Sora!" Riku called out.

"Yeah?"

"I'm not going to hit you this time."

And with that, he launched himself at the nearby Nobodies.

"I'd stay clear, if I were you," Axel warned over his crackling flames.

"Duly noted," Squall said.

It didn't seem to matter. Riku shot about the battle area, missing Sora in his gliding telekinetic light-based prowess, Axel in his circle of inferno, Rinoa in her chain-casting Meteor glory, and Squall in his own version of epicness.

Considering he had just Lionhearted the nearest fifty-some Nobodies and a couple of Heartless that had come to see the Keyblades.

After Leon had finished his Limit Break, Rinoa stopped casting Meteor. Axel's flames died down, Riku sent up five pillars of light to end his attack. Sora quietly slipped out of Final Form and Roxas joined them.

"I know why Riku didn't hit you," Roxas muttered.

"Yeah? Why?"

"Because Kairi's not here to yell at him for it."

"Really?" Sora asked.

Roxas grinned.

Riku rolled his eyes.

"Well," Leon said, surveying the Nobody-less area. "That seems to have taken care of things."

"They'll probably be back though," Riku muttered.

"If you just keep an eye on the area, things shouldn't get too bad," Rinoa said. "I mean, this place has a relative balance, even if it does lean toward the side of darkness."

"Speaking of balance," Leon said, putting an arm around Rinoa. "We should probably get back to Hollow Bastion. There's still Heartless to deal with there."

"Would you like some more help?" Roxas asked.

"I think we have it covered for now," Rinoa replied. "But we will call you if something changes. Or, rather, Cid will call you."

Riku nodded, showing at least _someone _understood.

"You guys have means of getting back?" she asked. "If not, I could teleport you."

"Nah, we've got a star shard," Sora said, elbowing Riku.

Riku pulled the star shard out of his pocket.

"Okay then!" Rinoa smiled. "We'll see you around then!"

With that, she and Squall headed back to the Ragnarok.

"Well, _that _was certainly a way to spend the afternoon," Axel said, cracking his knuckles.

"Agreed," Roxas said. "Do you think the girls are back from shopping yet?"

"They weren't back when Rinoa summoned you?" Riku asked.

Roxas shook his head.

"Then it is unlikely that they are back now," Riku replied.

"But we just spent…"

"Roxas," Axel said, putting a hand on the blonde's shoulder. "How many times do I have to tell you? Girls are a completely different species!"

All four of the boys laughed at that.

xx

Axel and Roxas decided to go get ice-cream after the day's events. They invited Sora and Riku to come along, but the latter two declined. Instead, they decided to go over to the play island and practice their Keyblade-wielding skills. Sora wanted to improve his magic and Riku wanted to get better at light-based attacks.

"Still working on getting those level three spells, aren't you?" Riku asked, watching Sora cast two Magneras in a row.

"I can get the basic ones," Sora replied. "Especially when I drive. But Magnega and Stopga are harder."

"_You_ use Magnet and Stop?"

"Well, Donald usually did," Sora replied with a shrug. "But I've seen Ven and Aqua use them and they look pretty awesome. I want to be able to do that too!"

Riku laughed and went over to help. Light attacks could wait until tomorrow.

xx

As the evening wore on, Sora and Riku made their way back to the main island. They were joined not too long afterwards by Roxas. Axel, apparently, had other things that he wanted to do and had disappeared by use of a star shard.

"So what do you think the girls are up to?" Sora asked, sitting in a tree down the street from their houses. "It's getting late!"

"I'm sure they're fine," Roxas said, leaning up against the tree. "I mean, they can handle themselves against most enemies."

"Most?" Riku asked. He was sitting in a different tree, one closer to the nearby path.

"Okay, that's an understatement. I'm sure they can handle anyone. I mean, it's not like they're going to go up against anything worse than Heartless or Nobodies right? Not in any of the places they'd go for _clothes_."

Sora pondered this. "Twilight Town's got Heartless and Nobodies. Hollow Bastion's got Heartless…"

"Wouldn't it be funny if they went to Hollow Bastion and helped Cid with the Heartless problem?" Riku laughed.

"That would be funny!" Roxas agreed.

"Hey! I think that's them!" Sora said, looking down the path.

Riku beckoned them to be quiet. The three of them waited until the girls were closer.

"…Plus, if we tell them now," Xion was saying. "It'll save explanation later. Since we're bound to run into them again."

"That settles that then," Kairi agreed. "We'll tell them."

Riku laughed and jumped out of the tree, landing right behind Kairi.

"Tell us what?" he asked.

Kairi jumped a good six inches. "Don't _do _that!" she complained.

"Hi!" Namine said, looking excitedly over at Riku.

He smiled. "Hello."

"So, tell us what?" Roxas asked, continuing the question. "Does it have anything to do with you being gone for like, a whole day?"

"We weren't gone that long, were we?" Namine frowned.

"I feel like girls could shop forever!" Sora exclaimed.

"Time passes differently in different worlds, does it not?" Kairi mused. "Could not the same apply for other universes?"

"Say what?"

Sora's words captured the essence of what he, Riku, and Roxas were all thinking.

"So we were in a parallel universe today," Namine said.

"We're nearly positive it was the one that Joseph was from," Kairi added.

"How can you be sure?" Riku asked.

"Well, Cid seemed to have heard of a Joseph that fit the description," Namine said. "Plus, the stuff that we were hearing about their Riku and their Namine fit what Joseph had said about them. Rebellion and all."

"Start from the beginning," Riku said.

"Right, so it all started with the star shard going off in Kairi's pocket…" Xion began.


	5. Enter Captain Hook

**Author's Note:** Hi! So... gosh... so much plotting has been done. Okay, here we go, scene with Terra, Aqua and Ventus. I confess this one was actually a bit harder for me to write. I haven't been writing them as long as I've been writing everyone else. So, it's a learning process.

Flightfoot, Roxas was joking about Riku. The idea behind it is Riku would only hit Sora with Dark Aura when Kairi's around to freak out/yell at him for it. It's like a Murphy's Law sort of thing.

Let's see, I answered the combos question in a blog post the other day. I'll be posting more about combos that haven't appeared yet in a later blog post... get your thoughts on them ahead of time and whatnot.

I will answer other questions in a blog post within the next couple of days. If you have something that you REALLY wanna know, post a question in your review and I *just might* answer it if it's not too horribly spoilery.

**EDIT: **So I need names for minor characters later in the fic. If you want to be awesome and give me both girl and boy names for the charries, that would be super-amazing. I can give you a cookie and the names that I choose will be used in an upcoming chapter later down on the road.

* * *

><p>"He'll be fine, he always is."<p>

xx

"I know it's been a while since I've been here," Ven said, looking out onto the clear blue sea. "But it doesn't feel like it has been."

"Not much has changed," Terra observed.

"The scenery hasn't, anyway," Aqua said. "I wonder if Peter's still around. He was the one I promised that we'd all come back to visit."

"You met Peter?" Ven asked, his eyes going wide.

Aqua nodded. "Nice boy. Good leader."

"Good fighter," Terra admitted.

"Aw," Ven groaned. "I promised I'd bring back better treasure when I returned."

He patted his pockets.

"I've got nothing!"

Before Terra or Aqua could respond, a small, golden pixie joined them. She tinkled about, seemingly conflicted about something.

"Hey, I remember you," Ven said, waving a hand. "You're Peter's friend, right?"

"Sure is!" came the boyish voice of Peter.

"Peter!" Ven exclaimed.

"Howdy everybody!" Peter said. "Long time, no see? Looks like you all haven't changed a bit!"

"Neither have you," Aqua observed.

"No one grows up here," Peter said, off-handedly. "But do you want to explain yourselves?" He continued before the other three had a chance to process the first bit of information.

"I was asleep," Ven said, casually putting his arms behind his head.

"I was wandering about in a place you don't particularly age very fast," Aqua said, placing her arms on her hips.

"I suppose you could say I was a Nobody," Terra coughed, crossing his arms rather sourly over his chest.

Peter blinked for a couple of seconds. Then he shrugged.

"I've heard stranger. So! Do you want to shoot yourselves out of the cannon into the Mermaid Lagoon?"

"What?" Aqua asked, worry immediately creeping into her voice.

"I promise it's safe, so long as you've got a little pixie dust!"

Tinker Bell rolled her eyes and jangled something dejectedly.

"Yes, Tink," Peter warned. "Aqua, too."

"What's the problem?" Aqua asked.

"Tinker Bell's just jealous. She'll get over it," Peter said, waving the matter away with his hands. "So, cannon balling?"

"Quite literally," Terra mused.

Ven laughed.

"Where did you get the cannon?" Aqua asked.

"From Hook's ship."

"Where's Hook?" Terra asked.

"Oh, ever since Sora last came through here, he's been stranded on an island with his crew. He'll work his way off eventually." Peter shrugged as he said this.

The trio were not in the least bit surprised that Sora had a hand in that.

"I'm still hesitant about the idea," Aqua said.

"Well, if you don't want to do that," Peter said. "We could always do another treasure hunt!"

"Don't you need a map for that?" Aqua asked.

Peter frowned, thinking. "Hmm, I suppose that's true. Well, follow me and I'll think of something."

They hadn't gone very far when one of the Lost Boys ran up to them. He was thin and dressed as a rabbit.

"Pan! Come quick!" he said, tugging on Peter's wrist.

"What is it?" Peter asked.

"More of the Heartless!"

"Heartless?" Terra, Aqua and Ven all said rather simultaneously.

"Rally the troops!" Peter said. "We're going on a hunting trip!"

The Lost Boy saluted and ran off.

"Why are there Heartless here?" Aqua asked.

"They show up every time Hook's in a particularly foul mood," Peter said, grimacing. "But there's not usually many of them and we can take care of them with slingshots and stuff."

"Would you like some help?" Ven asked, summoning his Keyblade.

"The more the merrier!" Peter exclaimed, starting to fly off.

Ven looked from Aqua to Terra. Both of them nodded and the three of them ran off after Peter, Terra and Aqua summoning their Keyblades as well.

It did not take long to find the Heartless. There were probably only a dozen of them, all of them of either the Shadow or the Darkball variety.

"Easy enough," Terra said, slicing through one of the Darkballs.

Aqua cast Magnega, summoning the nearest three or four to her. Then she proceeded to attack them with both Firaga and Blizzaga rather simultaneously.

Ven darted amongst the Shadows, taking them down rather easily.

Peter pulled out his dagger and went after a Darkball.

By the time the Lost Boys showed up with a various array of wooden swords, slingshots, and the like, only one Darkball remained.

The four of them let the Lost Boys take care of it.

"Well, that was interesting," Aqua said.

"Hook must be rather angry today," Peter said. "That was more than usual."

Terra, Aqua and Ven exchanged glances. A dozen Heartless was a very small amount of Heartless. If they usually showed up in less amounts than that, then Neverland was quite well off.

"I hear they're drawn to the Keyblade," Ven said, looking down at his. "That could be part of it."

Peter shrugged, not particularly caring anymore.

"Blast you! Peter Pan!"

"Aw, nuts, it's old Hook again," one of the Lost Boys complained.

"Got himself unstranded rather quickly," Peter said, his brows furrowing.

The group of them looked out to the ocean. As expected, there was Hook standing in a rowboat as Smee rowed.

"You have thwarted me for the last time!" Hook growled.

Peter rolled his eyes and crossed his hands over his chest. "I have company. Can't we do this later?"

"We'll do this now!" Hook said, stepping out of the boat into the shallows. He started to march toward land, pulling out his sword. He was headed straight for Peter and the others. The Lost Boys readied their weapons. Aqua, Terra and Ven stayed back, but they didn't banish their Keyblades.

"Suit yourself," Peter said, flying over to engage Hook in a blade fight.

"Captain!" Smee shouted. "Do you want me to get the others?"

Hook didn't respond, however, he was too focused on Peter. However, with that focus, came more Heartless.

"That is one dark heart," Terra murmured.

"Let's get them!" Aqua said, running over.

Ven looked over at the Lost Boys. "Fire when ready," he said, grinning.

The boys' eyes all lit up. One of them, who looked like a bear, held up his slingshot and aimed it right at Hook. He released and it hit Hook square in the forehead. Hook spluttered and tried to regain his composure. As he did so, the amount of Heartless ceased to grow for that brief moment.

"Keep him distracted!" Aqua shouted, chucking her Keyblade through some Shadows.

"Got it!" the Lost Boy said. He and the others continued their barrage.

Ven joined Aqua and Terra of getting the rid of the Heartless while Peter and the Lost Boys focused on Hook. Smee had taken refuge under one of the seats in the rowboat, not at all interested in getting involved.

Hook was rather angry and therefore, he had power behind his slashes, but he was also becoming careless and Peter was definitely outwitting him. Plus, it did not help that he was being pelted with rocks and smaller seashells as the Lost Boys picked those up and slung them at him. The amount of the Heartless gradually decreased as no more kept coming and Aqua, Terra and Ven took care of the rest of them.

Aqua took a moment and sent a Curaga out. Peter laughed and let out a flurry of stabs.

"Smee!" Hook wailed. "Get the bag!"

"Right, Captain!" Smee stuttered, pulling a large sack out of the rowboat. He tottered over to Hook and Peter.

"Get him!" Hook screeched.

Smee then tried to capture Peter in the bag. Peter laughed at him.

"Why thank you!" he said, taking the bag from Smee. He flew up and put the bag over Hook's head. The Lost Boys laughed. Hook scrambled around for a bit, before managing to poke his sword out the top and cut a hole large enough to get his head through. However, before he could cut himself free completely, Peter stole both the sword and Hook's hat. He jabbed the sword at Hook and put the hat on simultaneously.

Ven laughed, though Aqua tried to silence him with a look.

"What do you think, men?" Peter said, looking at the Lost Boys. "The cannon?"

"The cannon! The cannon!" the Lost Boys cheered.

"Tink, if you would?" Peter asked.

Tink saluted and sprinkled pixie dust all over Hook. Hook sneezed.

"Now remember, you codfish," Peter said. "Think happy thoughts!"

"To the ship!" the Lost Boys chorused.

Peter jabbed the sword into Hook again, who jumped.

"Blast you Peter! Let me out this instant! Smee!"

Smee looked like he was unsure of what to do.

Peter looked at Smee and raised an eyebrow.

"I'm a'goin', I'm a'goin," Smee said, dejectedly.

He got back into the rowboat.

"Smee!" Hook snarled. "Where are you going?"

"I'm gonna sit this one out, Captain," Smee said, starting to row away. "I'll come get you later."

"Smee!" Hook cried. It sounded a lot like a whimper. Ven started laughing again. Even Terra snorted. Aqua sighed.

"Peter, are you sure this is a good idea?" she said.

"It'll be fun!" Peter said. "Plus, it'll keep this ol' codfish from bothering us."

As he said this, he puffed out his chest with pride.

Aqua looked from Terra to Ven for support on this one. But it was very obvious that she wasn't going to get it.

It took quite a bit of time to get Hook to the ship, considering he struggled quite a bit. But, that was to be expected and this didn't seem to deter Peter or the Lost Boys in the slightest. Terra, Aqua and Ven came along. Aqua had given up arguing the issue.

It took three of the Lost Boys to stuff Hook into a cannon. Then, with quite the chorus of shouts and jeers, the cannon was lit and Hook was blasted off.

"Think happy thoughts!" Peter shouted.

Hook screamed, but did float a little as he neared the water. He landed almost gracefully and then treaded water while still shouting at Peter. No one could hear him though. It didn't take too long for Smee to row up to him and pull him onboard. They rowed away after that.

"Are days always this eventful here?" Aqua found herself asking.

"Eh," Peter said. "Some more than others."

"I had fun," Ven said, shrugging.

"And that's what matters!" Peter said.

"Will Hook be alright?" Aqua asked.

"He'll be fine," Peter said, blowing it off. "He always is."

"You worry too much," Terra said.

She frowned.

"Lighten up, Aqua," Ven said. "Life's good, right now! Plus, we took care of a lot of Heartless! This world's holding its own quite well."

"World?" Peter asked, scratching his head.

"Don't worry about it," Terra said.

He almost expected Peter to argue, but the boy did not. Seemingly, as soon as Terra had said not to worry, Peter stopped thinking about it entirely.

"We should probably be off," Aqua said.

"Aw, so soon?" Peter said. "You just started visiting."

"Aw, come on, Aqua," Ven said. "Can't we stay a bit longer?"

"Well…"

Three very boyish faces were instantly pleading with her.

"I suppose so."

They all grinned. She smiled as well.


	6. Under Mouse Arrest

**Author's Note: **Sorry this took a bit... I am swamped between school, Disney, and a potential boyfriend. :P Anyway, a repeat of the call for names, just for those who didn't leave any last chapter. I've got a few chapters yet before I need to have them, so there's still time to submit :)

Also, another question for you. Do you want scenes with just the FF charries in Hollow Bastion? Or are you okay with what you're getting when one of the KH charries heads over there?

I did a HUGE Q/A over on my blog, so go ahead and check that. (link's on my profile.) I'm actually trying to update the blog once a day with random information about the universe. Though, don't expect a post tomorrow, because I have NO CLUE when I'll have internet. But! Aside from that lol... enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Only Axel would need sleep before a vacation."<p>

xx

Axel chucked a rock at the sea. It fell into the water with an unsatisfying _plop_. He growled and chucked another one. It skipped once, then fell in as well.

He sighed and flopped down to the sand below, picking up a seashell to play with while he tried to collect his thoughts.

Stupid corridors of light. Stupid not knowing how to find Kuin.

He'd asked Master Yen Sid about them and was annoyed to hear Yen Sid state that corridors of light didn't exist. It wasn't until Axel and Ven both swore that they'd seen one that Yen Sid amended his original statement.

Corridors of light haven't existed, for years. Many, _many _years. Before Yen Sid's time, years. And Axel didn't want to think about how long ago _that _was.

Apparently, they dated back to just after the walls around the worlds had gone up. They were around alongside the Lanes Between, but the Lanes Between were still active now. Light corridors weren't.

The biggest difference was that with the Lanes Between, there was travel time. Light corridors were more like dark corridors in the fact that there was instantaneous transportation from point A to point B. Unlike dark corridors though, there was 1) no Betwixt and Between, you were either here or there; and 2) well, they were light.

Yen Sid had said that only certain devices could form them. Typically, they were objects like gliders, though more unconventional ones had been reported. Yen Sid seemed surprised that one was still active today. Though, he did say he'd try to research the matter further.

Not that he'd gotten back to Axel on any of his findings.

This, of course, assuming he'd come up with anything at all.

Granted, there was the fact that he didn't necessarily have to follow Kuin via light corridors. Dark corridors and star shards would work just fine.

So, perhaps he was just procrastinating on actually going after her. For whatever reason.

But, he had to wonder, how was Kuin so special in order to have a glider that formed light corridors?

He had to admit, it was oddly attractive.

He lay back in in the sand, resting his head in his hands.

He'd been laying there for all of two minutes when a shadow blocked his sunlight.

He opened his eyes to find himself face-to-face with both Roxas and Xion.

"What are you doing?" Xion asked.

"Thinking," he said. "You're interrupting me."

"What are you thinking about?" Roxas asked.

_Some things never change,_ he mused.

"About trying to find someone who'd know what a light corridor is, how you make one, and how to track someone who uses them," Axel said.

"Have you thought about asking the King?" Roxas asked. "He seems to know all sorts of stuff like that."

Axel sat up. "You know, I hadn't thought of that. I'm going to go do that now."

He pulled his star shard out of his pocket.

"Axel," Xion said, pausing him. "What is this about?"

"I'll let you know when I know more," he said, activating the star shard.

"What _is _he up to?" he heard her ask before completely being bounced away.

He arrived in a garden and shook his head to clear it from the buzzing.

"Can we help you?" someone asked.

He looked over to see Queen Minnie and Lady Daisy. It was Lady Daisy who had spoken. She was looking at him with a rather miffed expression on her face. Axel looked down to make sure he hadn't landed on any flowers. He hadn't. Maybe it was just her…

"I'm here to ask the King a question," Axel said. "If he's around. It's not urgent, but it is something that he might know."

Daisy frowned at him. Minnie, however, pointed to a walkway leading up to the castle.

"He'll be in his office," she said, smiling. "It's impossible to miss."

He nodded his head in her direction. "Thank you."

With that, he started walking off in the direction Minnie had pointed out. He didn't run into anyone on the way, save for a couple of bucket-carrying brooms. He'd seen stranger things to be bothered by that.

Minnie was right about the office being impossible to miss. The doors were quite giant. He knocked and found that a smaller door inside of the larger door opened to his knock.

He walked in.

Mickey was seated at a desk, scribbling a letter out frantically. He looked up when Axel walked in and frowned for a second. Then his face relaxed as he realized who the intruder was and he motioned for Axel to take a seat across the desk.

"Were you expecting someone else?" Axel asked.

"Pete," Mickey replied, returning to his letter. "He's been interrupting me on irrelevant things all morning. If you'll excuse me just one second…"

He finished writing a couple of lines, then rolled the letter up, sealing it when he had finished.

"Who's the letter to? If you don't mind me asking."

"I'm trying to find an old friend of mine. He's been missing for nearly a year now. I'm hoping that maybe one of these letters will make it to him."

"Ah."

Mickey shoved the letter into a glass bottle and set it aside for the moment.

"What can I do for ya?" he asked.

"I was wondering if you knew anything about light corridors," Axel said, resting his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands.

Mickey frowned and sat back, pondering this.

"Well, I, uh, do know that they haven't been used in a while. Ya gotta have a device that forms the corridor…"

"So Yen Sid mentioned," Axel muttered.

"You've already spoken to Master Yen Sid about this?"

Axel nodded.

Mickey sighed. "Then I'm not sure if there's anything new that I can tell ya."

"But haven't you studied the pathways between the worlds?"

Mickey smiled. "I stuck mainly to star shards and Gummi Ships."

Axel sighed.

"There is one person that might know, though, aside from Master Yen Sid."

"Yeah?"

"Yes. Ansem."

Axel blanched.

"Not Xehanort's Heartless," Mickey amended.

"No, I didn't think of him at first," Axel said. "I know the Ansem you're talking about. Ansem the Wise, he used to be the ruler of Radiant Garden."

Mickey nodded.

"So wait, he's still around after everything… that, erm, happened to him?"

If Mickey suspected Axel's involvement in such events, he didn't say.

"Well, for a while, he went around as DiZ," Mickey said.

Axel snorted. "That explains a lot."

"But ever since the artificial Kingdom Hearts exploded in The World that Never Was, he hasn't been seen."

Axel suddenly had a pretty good idea on who the letter was to.

"I'm sorry, Axel," Mickey apologized. "I don't think I was much help."

"Nah, it's all right," Axel said, dismissing the apology. He wasn't sure if he liked having the King apologize to him. _Him _of all people.

"Why do you want to know, if ya don't mind me asking?"

"I saw someone use one the other day and I wanted to be able to follow them, but I'm not sure how to go about doing that."

"I can see how that would be disconcerting, considering light-travel is rather instantaneous," Mickey allowed. "However, there are other means of getting from world to world. Especially for those who know more than one world exists."

"Yeah, I had thought about that."

"Well, don't give up either way. The greatest adventures sometimes start with just the smallest bit of curiosity. In the meantime, I'll keep an eye out for light corridors. I'd like to meet this person who uses them, whoever they may be."

The thought of someone like Kuin sitting down and talking to the King was almost comical, but Axel refrained from laughing out loud. He stood up and gave a little bow.

"Well, thank you," he said. "I'll let you know if I see Ansem."

"Really?"

Axel nodded. "Of course. I can't promise I'll run into him. But I can promise that I'll let you know if I do."

Mickey smiled and nodded.

"Thank you."

Axel nodded one last time before walking out of the office. He activated the star shard just outside, heading back to Destiny Islands. He hadn't learned much, but he now had more food for thought.

The most obvious thing to do next would be to go to different worlds and look around for her.

But there were a lot of worlds…

xx

"Oh dear…"

Namine's voice brought him out of his thoughts, even with being muffled after the star shard experience.

"I _told _you not to sort through all those loose drawings out here!" he heard Xion taunt.

"How did I end up on this island?" Axel asked, looking at the Paopu tree. He had intended to arrive out on the beach, where there was less of a possibility of running into someone.

Xion was casually sitting on the Paopu tree. Namine was on the ground, mere feet from where Axel had showed up. She appeared to have been sorting through loose pictures that she had drawn. However, most of them were scattered about the small islet due to the displacement of air that had occurred when Axel had appeared.

"Star shards can be finicky," Namine replied. "Xion, can you grab that one?"

Namine pointed to an image that was fluttering behind Xion. Xion leaned backwards off the tree and gathered the picture. She returned it to Namine.

"These are old drawings, aren't they?" Axel asked, recognizing some of them from Castle Oblivion.

"Yes," Namine said. "I've gathered up all of them and I wanted to sort them into different categories. I've got folders to put them in now."

"Then there's the ones that she's keeping out to plaster up all over her wall," Xion said, pointing to an undisturbed pile. Namine had probably thrown her hand down over that one when Axel had arrived to protect it.

"Kairi's parents said I could, and I want to," Namine said with a shrug. "It'll make it more homey."

"And that's not including the ones that are on the fridge in Riku's house," Xion teased.

Deciding that he wasn't really a part of this conversation, Axel started to leave.

"Axel, you look like you could use a vacation," Xion said.

He turned around, raising an eyebrow at her. "What makes you say that?"

"You're thinking too much. We're living on a beach, practically! Relax!"

_Easy for you to say, _Axel found himself thinking. _You've been listening to Roxas._

Arguably, he could be listening to Roxas too.

"What are you suggesting?" he asked.

"Take a day off. You, me and Roxas can just enjoy a day on the beach." She gestured to the beach around them. "You can, too," she added, looking at Namine.

"Sounds fun," Namine said, not looking away from her drawings.

"Okay," Axel said. "Tomorrow, we'll do that. Provided Heartless don't show up or something."

"Don't wish that on this place," Namine said. "Not that I'm saying Heartless will invade Destiny Islands again, but still; don't wish that."

"I wasn't saying I wanted Heartless to appear," Axel argued. "And I didn't say they were going to appear here, either. I'm just saying. Let's all take a day off tomorrow, provided we don't get a call from someone saying they need our help elsewhere."

"Sounds like a plan!" Xion said, sounding rather excited about the whole idea.

_And to think, she was the girl who trained all through her last vacation…_

"Axel, would you like to have a picture?" Namine asked, offering one out to him.

It was of him, Roxas and Xion sitting on the Clocktower, enjoying some ice cream.

"Where did that one come from?" Xion asked.

Namine shrugged. "A lot of ones with you in them disappeared for a while, and I've been finding them all over the place as of late."

"'Cause that makes sense."

"Memories never do."

Axel took the picture that Namine was offering out to him.

"Thanks," he said.

"Sure, no problem," she replied. Then, she gestured to a picture that was caught in a bush behind him. "Can you grab that one?"

He went over and grabbed the image. He stole a glance at it and instantly wished he hadn't.

"What possessed you to draw this?" he asked, looking at a black-and-white image of him and Saix fighting. It wasn't just any fight, either. There was a claymore in his gut.

Namine bit her lip. "I don't always mean to draw what I end up drawing. You can destroy it if you want to."

He handed the picture to her. "Nah, I couldn't do that. Do you draw a lot of pictures like that? Or, of me, even?"

"I draw pictures of everyone. Sometimes, they're of battle, other times not. Some, I'm not sure."

She opened a nearby sketchbook to a picture of Xigbar and Zexion. Zexion was backed against a wall, Xigbar was aiming his guns at him.

"You don't think Xigbar killed Zexion, do you?" Xion asked.

"I don't get that idea," Namine said. "But I can't be sure."

"Well, if we see Zexion around somewhere, we know the outcome," Axel said. "Now, unless there's something else you need me for, I'm going to go sleep to get ready for my vacation tomorrow."

As he walked away, he could hear Xion say: "Only Axel would need to sleep before a vacation."

He laughed in spite of himself.


	7. A Meager Clue

**Author's Note: **So, this one's a bit shorter than usual... but, I think the content makes up for it :P Anyway, erm, I was going to say something. Nope. Can't remember. All I know is that I was watching Beauty and the Beast this morning and I now have five more chapter's worth of plot. Woohoo! I've also hit 50,000 words! Take that Nanowrimo! Anywho, if I remember my important thing I was going to say, I'll post it in a blog post later today/this evening/when I have internet again. Happy belated Thanksgiving to all of you!

EDIT: I remembered what I was going to say! I never actually wrote the scene where Kairi, Namine, and Xion recount their adventures in a parallel universe because I was afraid I'd write myself into a corner... However, I did write a snippet of conversation between them all and I posted it to my blog. Ha, I knew it was important.

EDIT 2: I am SO SO SO SO SO SO SO sorry to all of you who stumbled upon the mis-posted chapter. When I put up the first edit (see above) I put it in the wrong document... and then replaced the right chapter with the wrong chapter. And then I didn't notice because the Live Preview wasn't updated. Stupid fanfic. Here is the right chapter.

* * *

><p>"Riku! I am going to kill you!"<p>

xx

Kairi and Namine sat on Sora and Riku's shoulders, respectively. They were playing the game where one tried to knock the other one off into the water without falling in themself.

"No fair!" Namine said. "Kairi's stronger than me!"

"Would you like some help?" Riku asked, sounding very cocky in that particular moment.

"Riku!" Kairi cautioned. "That's cheat_ing!_"

She hadn't even finished her sentence before she and Sora were both drenched. Riku laughed. Even Namine smiled.

"Riku!" Kairi yelled, moving wet strings of hair out of her face. "You're not supposed to help!"

"The rules say I can't push Sora," Riku replied. "They say nothing about me kicking his feet out from under him."

Sora spat water in Riku's face.

"Charming," Riku said, frowning.

Namine rested her chin on Riku's head. "Shall we go again?"

"Yes!" Kairi replied. "But only if Riku doesn't cheat."

"I don't think I'm up for another round," Sora said, eyeing Riku. The look on Riku's face _clearly _stated that he was not below cheating again.

"Oi! Roxas!" Riku called out. "You and Xion want to play?"

Roxas, who was floating lazily in the ocean, sat up and looked at Riku.

"Xion's gone diving for sea shells," he said. "But I can ask her when she gets back."

"Oh fine then," Riku said. He tilted his head up slightly. "Shall I let you down?"

"I'm perfectly content to stay here, if that's all right with you?"

"I'm fine," Riku said.

"Kairi! Look! It's purple!" cried Xion.

She appeared out of seemingly nowhere. She waded over to where Kairi was standing and held out a purple Thalassa shell.

"If I found enough of them, do you think you could make a charm out of them for me?"

Kairi nodded. "I don't see why not. I had been thinking about making one for all of us—to keep us safe on our travels."

"Cool! Want to help me find more?"

Kairi looked over at Riku and Namine.

"We were going to ask you if you wanted to play a game," Namine said. "But you look like you're busy doing something else."

"Sorry," Xion said.

"No, no, keep doing what you're doing," Riku said. "Don't worry about it."

Xion nodded and swam back out to deeper waters. Kairi swam out after her.

"Hey, Axel," Sora said, looking at the very dry red-head. "Are you going to get in the water?"

"I don't do water," Axel replied, looking at Sora over the top of his sunglasses.

"You got in the ocean the other day," Roxas argued.

"Yes, but that was maybe knee-deep and all we were doing was splashing each other in the face. I'm not gonna do more than that."

"Come on," Riku said. "You know you want to."

"Nope."

"Either you get in, or you have to tell us what you were up to yesterday," Roxas said.

"I don't see the need to do either," Axel replied.

"I am not above soaking you from here," Roxas said.

"Neither am I," Riku added.

Namine tightened her grip.

Axel rolled his eyes. "So I saw someone form a light corridor the other day—don't tell me that they don't exist, 'cause they do. I've been asking around, trying to figure out how to track the person who used them."

"Sounds intriguing," Namine said.

"It'd be better if someone had answers," Axel muttered. "The King said that the only person who might know anything else is Ansem the Wise—and no one's seen him since Kingdom Hearts exploded."

Riku and Sora exchanged glances.

"I'm going to set you down," Riku said.

"Yeah, sure, go for it," Namine replied.

Riku ducked down into the water and Namine disentangled herself from his shoulders.

"What are those looks for?" Axel asked.

"We saw him," Sora said.

"Ansem the Wise?"

"If he still actually goes by that," Riku said quietly. "But yes, we saw him. At the Dark Margin."

"When was this?" Axel asked.

"Erm, right after Xehanort blasted us there," Sora replied.

"Right, I'll be back…" Axel said, starting to get up.

"Where are you going?" Namine asked.

"Well, I'd go straight to the Dark Margin, but I need a cloak, so I'm heading back to the inn first, then…"

Namine cleared her throat.

"What?"

"Vacation, Axel."

He sighed and settled back down into the sand.

"Is it really that important to you?" he asked.

"You said that today would be a vacation, barring Heartless."

Axel found it very hard to argue with her.

"Fine, I'll go tomorrow."

"Do you want me to come with?" Roxas asked.

"I think I can take care of myself," Axel argued.

Roxas rolled his eyes. "Just trying to add some friendly backup."

"Fine, but if the Heartless attack, I'm blaming you and your Keyblade."

"It's called going straight to the Dark Margin," Roxas said. "We'd have to use a Dark Corridor anyway."

Namine's eyes widened, thinking about the hearts at stake.

"They've both got cloaks," Riku said. "Well, Roxas can take one of the three of Sora's."

"That were mine originally," Roxas pointed out.

As Roxas and Axel discussed the best way to go about looking for Ansem if he wasn't in the Dark Margin, Namine turned to Riku.

"Don't you object to this, though? Usually you're pretty against this sort of thing."

"Oh, I have twenty arguments for Axel lined up on my head, doesn't mean any one of them is going to stop him. Besides, I'm intrigued about these light corridor things, and this might be the only way to learn something."

Namine bit her lip. "Maybe if Xion and I went instead."

"Xion, I get," Riku said. "But how does _you _going change anything."

"I've got quite a bit of data too," Namine said, shrugging. "Plus, all the light from Kairi's heart has got to protect me…"

Riku frowned.

"You don't like the idea, do you?"

"Not particularly."

About then, Axel laid down a rule of "no girls."

Riku, Namine and Sora all rolled their eyes at that.

"Hey, Axel," Namine said, trying to change the subject. "How about you come play with us? You and Roxas against Sora and Riku."

"And what would you do?" Axel asked.

"Referee," she stated.

"Biased," Roxas coughed.

"Nah, how about you just go up against one of them."

That caused all four of the others to laugh.

"Will it get you all to shut up if I play a round?"

They nodded.

He sighed and stood up. Roxas and Sora cheered.

"Kids these days," Axel muttered.

"You say that like you're _so _much older than the rest of us."

"I've been around for quite a long time, thank you very much," Axel argued. "I could probably consciously remember a time when you were all in diapers. Well, half of you anyway."

Roxas and Namine shrugged.

Axel waded out to where they were. "If I get seriously wet, I'm not going to be happy."

"I don't play fair," Riku admitted with a shrug.

"Now he admits it," Sora muttered.

"Now you're on his team," Roxas pointed out.

"Good point," Sora said.

_"Namine! You should come look at these!"_

"I'm going to go look at what Kairi and Xion are up to," Namine said, looking at Riku.

"Aw, so you don't want to watch us beat each other up?" Sora asked.

Roxas frowned. Riku laughed.

"Ah, no. Not when you put it like that."

With that, she swam out to where Kairi and Xion were. The two of them had collected quite the bunch of Thalassa shells.

"Kairi's going to make good-luck charms for all of us!" Xion exclaimed.

"Do you want blue or gold?" Kairi asked, holding up the different colored shells as she said each color.

"Blue," Namine replied almost instantly, looking at what shade of blue they were.

"I think Roxas should have gold," Xion added.

"I'll make Riku a blue one, too," Kairi said, thinking. "And I'll make myself a pink one. Axel?"

"Maybe if you mix the gold and the pink to make it look more fiery?" Xion suggested.

"That might work."

"Oh dear," Namine murmured, the action between Sora and Roxas catching her attention.

The two of them were locked hand-to-hand, trying to throw the other one off. Riku moved to kick Axel's legs out from under him. Axel went down. Roxas went down. Refusing to go down alone, Roxas held onto Sora's wrists, dragging him down into the ocean as well.

Not wanting to go in himself, Riku boosted Sora off and let him fall into the water. He moved his bangs out of his face and laughed heartily at Sora and Roxas' current predicament.

"I'm _wet_!" Axel growled.

Despite being completely drenched as well, both Sora and Roxas joined Riku in laughing. Mostly at Axel's expense.

Even Xion and Kairi started laughing. Namine tried to be polite and not laugh at the struggling pyro, but it was really hard _not _to laugh.

"Riku! I am going to kill you!"

Still laughing, Riku started swimming out into deeper water.

Axel growled some more.

Sora and Roxas burst into another round of laughter. It couldn't even be silenced by another glare from Axel.

"I love this family," Xion said through her giggles.

_Family_. Namine thought to herself. _That's a nice way of putting it._


	8. Apprehension

**Author's Note: **Hello again! Let me apologize (again) for uploading the wrong chapter. You're right, it belonged in Plan Beta... and I just totally tacked up the wrong one here. Regardless, that's fixed so if you haven't read the right chapter, it's up now. And now this chapter's up! Yay! I'd recommend you check out my blog 'cause I've got some happy stuff up there. And, I think that's all for now. Have a wonderful day everyone!

* * *

><p>"Now, now, no reason to get trigger-happy!"<p>

xx

Her shoes made crunching sounds against the snow. She made a face, cursing internally like she did every time she appeared someplace not quite so pleasant. She'd arrived in better places. However, since she had arrived here, there must be monsters nearby. That's what her glider was supposed to do: take her places that she needed to be to kill whatever it was that she had to kill.

She pulled out a cloak and put it on over the rest of her clothes. It wasn't like the cold was bothering her (yet), however if other people saw her, they'd have to wonder why she wasn't dressed for this weather. Part of her job description was to blend it.

Not that her job or job description was actually written out on paper. She was her own boss and made all of her own rules. But, blending in with her surroundings certainly made for less questions asked and therefore, an easier time of living.

She heard rustling behind her and she spun about, her right hand going right to her holster on her hip. She froze, waiting for whatever it was to make the next move. Something white came out of the bushes. It was merely a wolf.

She took her hand away from her weapon and nodded curtly to the animal. It stared at her with bright blue eyes. It walked over to her, sniffed her for a second, then walked away.

"Wonderful way to start a mission," she mused. "But hey, it wasn't feral."

She started to make her way through the snow again and was instantly thankful for the repelling spell she'd put on her shoes. Even though they were made of the thickest canvas, there was no way they'd be able to withstand _this _much damp snow.

She heard more rustling to the side and her hand was at her weapon again.

This time, it wasn't a local wolf. It was a buggy-looking creature. All black, bright yellow eyes.

"Heartless," she growled, pulling out both of her guns.

If there was one thing she had learned about Heartless over the past several years, it was that they always came in packs. Where there was one, there was bound to be at least two (if not five or a dozen) more. She'd been running into less of them as of late, but every now and then she'd stumble into a pack as she moved from world to world.

But, she'd rather deal with Heartless than those stupid Nobodies that took twice as long to kill. Or those things that looked like Heartless, but had red eyes rather than yellow. Those were a right pain.

Sure enough, four more Heartless joined the first one. She waited for them to get closer. It didn't take long for the Heartless to encircle her.

"After my heart, eh?" she taunted, not like she figured they'd actually respond.

She pulled the trigger on one gun, then the other. Each shot she fired hit its mark. Most of the Heartless went down in one shot, though the last one took two for whatever reason. No matter, they were all gone now. Her guns hadn't even started smoking yet. She blew over the barrels anyway out of sheer habit and slammed each of the butts against her hips to initiate the recharge sequence.

Laser guns, her best investment yet. Though, she did want to look into getting one of the bigger ones that could shoot off supercharged bullets. However, then she'd have to figure out how to carry it. And the shotgun was already bad enough.

Though, as nice as the shotgun was to have when she was faced with larger, or large amounts of, enemies, she was contemplating the idea of trading it in for a sniper rifle anyway.

If only she could have both; but that would require an attaché case that she _definitely _didn't want to bother with.

She didn't run into any other enemies (or wolves) as she made her way down the pitiful excuse for a path. She couldn't help but frown a little as said path dead-ended into a cliff edge. She could see a little village at the bottom of the mountain she was currently standing on. Off in the distance she could see a grand city with a palace.

"Nowhere to go but down," she said, pulling out her glider.

She glided down the mountain, sticking relatively close. As awesome as her glider was, it didn't like being too far off the ground for extended periods of time.

She made good time coming down. Down was generally easier than up, given the help of gravity. However, right as she neared the bottom, someone appeared almost literally in front of her. He arrived so suddenly that there was nothing she could do to avoid him.

"Yo! Watch it!" she shouted, hoping he'd move.

He didn't.

She crashed right into him, sending both of them tumbling through yet more snow.

"What do you think you're doing?" she said.

He didn't respond. She frowned and picked herself up. Her glider was okay, and that was all she particularly cared about. She healed well with potions and herbs. She turned to get a good look at her newfound annoyance.

He was wearing a black cloak, zipped all the way up. He also had the hood pulled up, hiding his face. Currently, he was muttering something about still being in the snow.

"I'm talking to you," she growled.

He got up, but still didn't respond. He didn't even look at her. She was about ready to whack him over the head with her glider. She didn't though, more out of protection of the glider than anything else. Him, she had no sympathy for at the moment.

"I am going to ask you one more time before I start shooting," she warned. "Who are you and what do you think you are doing?"

He turned to her, though it bothered her that she couldn't see his face. She couldn't even see a shadow of his nose or chin. It was unsettling.

"Now, now," he said. "No reason to get trigger-happy."

She didn't like his voice. It was cold and too-smooth sounding.

"I see plenty of reasons to get trigger-happy," she replied hotly. "You get in front of me, leaving me no choice but to run into you, then you hide your face and don't respond to any of my questions until I threaten to shoot you. And, to be quite frank, you _still _haven't answered any of my questions."

As she said this, she pulled out her guns and pointed them at his face, just to be sure he got the picture. She wanted to be quite certain that he knew who he was dealing with. Well, not particularly who, but that he had a good idea of what the consequences of his actions would be if she didn't like said actions.

"Can you repeat the question?"

She rolled her eyes and sighed. "Do you want to explain why you thought it would be a good idea to get in front of my glider as I was coming down the mountain?"

"I confess I didn't see you…"

She fired a warning shot into the ground just behind him.

"Eenh! Wrong answer!" she said.

He flinched.

"I was hoping that perhaps you were gaining momentum to go off-world and if I were to get in your way, I would be transported too."

"So obviously you're not from around here," she said, though this comment was mostly to herself. "Do you want to explain how you got stranded here then?"

He muttered something about dark corridors and old enemies.

"Quit your mumbling!"

"Ran into an old enemy of mine, he thought it would be an excellent idea to send me somewhere rather remote and desolate."

She wouldn't necessarily describe this place as "desolate", but she'd take remote.

"So you're just trying to leave, then?" she asked, wary.

"That would be correct."

"Where are you trying to go?"

"The World that Never Was."

"Pardon?"

"Anywhere I can get a star shard, really."

She racked her brain for knowledge of star shards. If she remembered correctly, they were little pieces of Gummi Block that transported the holder to other worlds without the need for protection to travel through whatever you called the in-between. So, this guy wanted to have the ability to travel more places independently. Was he planning on getting booted to other worlds frequently?

"You want to tell me where that would be?" she asked, finding herself growing impatient.

"Traverse Town," he said, speaking possibly the most clearly he had done since she'd (literally) run into him.

She pictured the world in her head. It was a hodgepodge of a world. It would be easy to purchase a star shard there.

She wondered if she should let him get away with this so easily. Part of her wanted to see if he was trustworthy enough to earn the right to the use of a light corridor. At the same time, she didn't want to be bothered by him for the remainder of this mission. What a predicament.

She decided very quickly that she didn't want to have to deal with him for much longer. However, she would make him do _something _in order for her to give in to his request.

"Okay," she said. "Traverse Town it is, but you've gotta do two things for me before I form you an exit."

She got the impression he was frowning.

"One, I would like to see your face. I don't like it when people hide their faces."

It means they're hiding something.

The man growled.

"I could just shoot you," she said, shrugging.

Grumbling some more, he reached up and pulled his hood down.

He had scraggly pink hair and very deep blue eyes. She wouldn't have a hard time remembering his face.

"And the second thing?" he asked, no more trace of a mumble whatsoever. She was beginning to wonder if the hesitation was all just an act.

"You're name."

This time she knew he was frowning.

"Marluxia."

She'd heard way too many names to even be bothered by this odd one. It reminded her oddly of that old coot, Xehanort. She wondered if there was a connection. She decided not to think too hard on that one though. As far as her records went, Xehanort was evil. Evil people must be destroyed. If this person was in cahoots with Xehanort, he would have to die too.

Better to give him the benefit of the doubt. He hadn't done anything more than be a nuisance.

"Right then," she said. "Have a good day."

She put her heel down forcefully on her glider, which was conveniently still sitting by her feet. There was a small purring noise and a light corridor formed two feet away from the pair of them.

The man stared at the corridor with wary intrigue.

She rolled her eyes, not having time for this. "Look, you walk through it, you'll step out in Traverse Town. I have a good sense of direction. Now go before I change my mind."

Taking only one more cautious glance at the corridor, he walked through. It disappeared behind him.

"That was ridiculous," she muttered, shoving her guns back into their holsters. She bent down and picked up her glider, collapsing it and stashing it away.

"I wonder what else I'm going to run into."

The answer to that question was nothing. She walked the rest of the way to the Village without seeing an enemy of any sort. She made her way through the Village quite peacefully. They seemed to be rebuilding and no one noticed her in her grey cloak. She'd pulled up her own hood to disguise her purple hair, considering everyone around seemed to have some shade of either black or brown.

She figured she'd head to the Palace. It seemed like a good place to start, unless she ran into whatever she was here for prior to getting there. She doubted running into that Marluxia guy was the reason why she'd come here in the first place. The Way of the Worlds didn't work like that.

She paused twice in the village. Once was to help out a little girl who'd had her doll stolen by what she assumed to be the girl's little brother. (Who said she had to be cold and stern all the time?) The second time she stopped was at a little Moogle. She had quite the reputation with Moogles (and creepy guys with trench coats, and traveling salesmen, and salesmen in shops that didn't travel.) Everywhere she went she bought two potions (or herbs, or mushrooms, or tomatoes, or whatever happened to be in the area). One was for now if she needed it, and one for later when she needed it.

"Two potions, please," she said.

The Moogle gave her two potions and she forked over the 40 munny.

She frowned as she realized she was running out of munny. She had quite a bit of gil; a sizeable amount of rupees (enough for a couple of potions anyway); she was running low on coins, but it'd be awhile before she needed to purchase anything with that denomination of currency again; she even had a few pitas, though that creepy guy with the trench coat had really cleaned her out. She'd have to acquire some more munny if she stayed in this area of town.

She thanked the Moogle and made her way out of the village, nodding politely at anyone who stole a glance at her. There weren't many people who did, but she figured she'd be polite to the ones who did bother to pay attention to someone who was trying to blend in.

Politeness went quite far if you let it. She nodded at one more person as she left and continued on with her mission.


	9. Who's There?

**Author's Note: **Another day, another chapter! I got so much of this written thanks to Nanowrimo woo! 60,000 words and some change in one month. That's 2,000 words a day. BAM! Next November I'll try for 3,000 :P

Okay, for those of you who have had questions, I've taken to answering them on my blog as they come in rather than promptly forgetting about them about the time I go to post the next chapter. So, keep watch out there for answers to your questions.

Speaking of questions, I'm gonna do another Q/A dump, so a lot of your questions will probably be reanswered there in more depth, or something, idk... But, with the giant Q/A, I'm willing to answer more stuff, so if you have questions about characters/plot/crossovers/stuff like that, I just might answer it so long as it's not too horribly spoilery. (It'd have to be pretty big...)

Anyway, I think that's all the business. Have a good day everyone!

* * *

><p>"A promise is a promise, right?"<p>

xx

"You _sure _you don't want me to come too?" Xion asked, standing outside the inn with Roxas and Axel.

"You don't have a cloak," Axel said, zipping his own cloak up.

"Kairi has three of mine," Xion pointed out.

Axel rolled his eyes. "No girls."

Xion turned at Roxas, who was already in his cloak and boots. He shrugged.

"I don't appear to have a say in the matter."

"Are you just not arguing because you don't think I can take care of myself?"

Axel snorted.

"No!" Roxas protested. "It's not that I think that. It's just…" He leaned in closer to her and whispered. "You know how stubborn Axel can be sometimes."

"I'm not deaf, you know."

Roxas and Xion laughed.

"And _this _is why you can't come," Axel said, looking at Xion. "Because you two will do _that _sort of thing all day and it will keep you from fighting at your best—if we have to fight. And I don't want to take that risk."

"Axel, we know how to be professional on missions," Xion argued.

"Okay, fine whatever. I just don't want to listen to you two."

"Aw, gee, thanks," Xion said, frowning.

"Come on, let's go," Axel said, not wanting to argue further.

"At least let me form the corridor," Xion said.

"No…"

Before Axel even had time to properly argue, Xion had stuck her hand out and formed the corridor. She grinned.

"Dark Margin, just like you wanted," she said. "Right next to that rock. Go on now, have fun! Be back for dinner!"

Axel grumbled, but walked through. Roxas took a moment to hug Xion before following their disgruntled friend.

xx

"What has got you in a mood?" Roxas asked as they walked through the brief Betwixt and Between to get to the Dark Margin.

Axel didn't respond.

"I don't like that you're not telling me," Roxas said.

Axel stopped short. Roxas kept walking, but then realized he was leaving Axel behind.

"Well don't stop here," he said.

"Right," Axel said, continuing to move again. "If I tell you, you have to promise not to laugh."

"Why would I laugh?"

"Because my words came back to bite me. And I hate it when they do that."

Before Roxas could wonder what Axel was going on about, they had arrived. There was a man sitting in a cloak just like theirs. He was seated so casually on the rock that Roxas had seen Xemnas sit on many a time. He looked like he had been sitting there a long while.

Axel cleared his throat. The man turned to look at them.

"Hello," he said. "More visitors. Do I know you?"

Roxas recognized the voice and blanched.

"DiZ?" he asked, trying to keep from growling.

"Ah, yes, the boy, Roxas."

Roxas frowned.

"I did not get a chance to apologize to you."

"Apologize?"

"For the hurt that I caused. Though I originally had lost all sense of who I was when I was carried here, I remember more and more as I sit here. Your life was one of the ones that I deeply harmed and I feel I must apologize."

Roxas felt very much like a deflated balloon. "Apology accepted," he said quietly.

Axel scratched the back of his neck, unsure of where he fit in this conversation. He cleared his throat once more.

"Ansem the Wise," he said.

"How long has it been since I heard that name?"

"Beats me," Axel said. "You are him, though, correct?"

The man nodded.

"Right, where to start?"

"Light corridors?" Roxas asked.

"Well, yes," Axel said.

"What about them?" Ansem the Wise asked.

"You know of them?"

Ansem the Wise nodded.

"Can you tell me how you get a device that makes them? And if it's possible to track a person who uses them."

"To answer your second question first," Ansem the Wise began. "I assume you mean track them by their use of the corridors?"

"Yes."

"It is not possible; not any more than it is to track where a dark corridor leads or where a star shard has disappeared off to…"

"Actually," Roxas interrupted. "I think Cid's working on being able to track star shards."

"That is a new development," Ansem the Wise said with a nod. "However, I am not surprised that Cid has managed such a thing."

"Possibility of tracking light corridors though?" Axel asked.

"Nearly impossible."

"Right."

"As for your first question, I do not know how one would acquire such a device. I do know they are rare. They are probably passed down within families."

"How many do you suppose are still around?" Axel asked.

"You've been studying this subject already, I see."

"More or less."

"Probably less than a dozen."

"Right."

"May I inquire as to why you are so curious about such an old-fashioned way of travelling?"

"Someone I saw used one. Wanted to find them and ask questions."

He shrugged, trying to act casual.

"The best thing you could do would be to go from world to world and ask if anyone has seen this person whom you seek."

"I figured it was coming to that."

Axel turned to go, forming a corridor behind him and Roxas.

"Thank you for your input," he said. "It was helpful. Do you wish to come back with us?"

"I am content to stay here so that I cannot bring about any more harm."

"Suit yourself," Axel said.

"So we're just going to leave him?" Roxas asked.

"You already did, once," Axel pointed out.

"Yeah, well, I had Sora begging to get back to Kairi."

"Valid point. However…"

They turned back to look at Ansem the Wise. He had gone back to staring out into the dark ocean.

Axel gave a curt nod and stepped through the corridor, Roxas right behind.

xx

"Do you want to explain why we're… wherever here is?" Roxas asked, looking at the giant white and blue castle in front of them.

"Welcome to Disney Castle," Axel said, starting to walk up to it.

"Why are we here?"

"Promised the King that I'd tell him if I ever saw Ansem. Figured I should follow through with that promise."

"Okay," Roxas said, jogging a tad to catch up. "Do you want to explain why you are so intent on figuring out light corridors now? Since I know there is more to it than just finding some random person who used one."

"Ask me that question when we get back to the Islands, okay?" Axel said. "Or at least someplace where not everyone's going to hear."

Roxas frowned a tad, but didn't question further. Instead, he decided to take in the sights. Disney Castle was quite a glorious place.

"Hello, Axel, and Roxas!" Goofy said as they passed him in the hall. "Why are you wearing Organization cloaks?"

"Business," Axel said, bowing cockily. "They make me feel epic."

Goofy and Roxas both laughed. Goofy then saluted and continued on his way, Axel and Roxas on theirs.

Roxas gaped at the giant door, and he gaped a bit more when there was a smaller door that opened into the office.

"Good afternoon," Axel said.

"Good afternoon," Mickey replied, putting his pen down. He was writing in a journal, rather than a loose-leaf piece of paper this time.

"I hope we're not interrupting," Roxas stammered.

"Not at all," Mickey said with a laugh. "Though I have to ask why you're wearing what you're wearing."

"Just came from the Dark Margin," Axel said.

Mickey's eyes widened. "Why in the Worlds would you go there?"

"Saw Ansem."

"How did you…?"  
>"Apparently, Riku and Sora saw him there before the Battle of Castle Oblivion. Turns out he was right where he'd left them. I just spoke with him."<p>

"Did you learn anything about light corridors?"

"Enough. I've gotta just go world-to-world searching for her. Though I am going to ask Cid about the possibility of tracking them. Roxas, here, gave me _that _idea."

Roxas had stopped listening. He'd latched onto the word 'her' and hadn't moved much past that.

"So there's a _girl _involved," he murmured.

"What?" Axel asked, looking at him. Then his eyes widened as he realized that he'd given the person that he'd been talking about in vague terms all this time a specific gender. And this was _why _he'd been speaking so vaguely.

"Oh," he said after a moment. "Yeah, there's a girl. Hey, now wait a second! How is it that you can latch onto _me_…"

He paused, unsure of how to put it. He wanted to say something with the punch line of Roxas not being able to see him and Xion, but Axel was unsure as to how to put the beginning of that phrase into words.

Because that would mean admitting to a bit more than the fact that he just found Kuin attractive.

Thankfully, King Mickey chose _not _to add in anything. Rather, he maneuvered around the little block that they'd reached in their conversation.

"If you do find this girl," he said. "I would still like to speak with her."

"Of course," Axel said, rather noncommittally, however.

"I need a cloak," Mickey mused. "My last one got lost in the Battle of A Thousand Heartless."

"Castle Oblivion," Axel said. "Best bet."

Mickey nodded. "Good idea, thank you."

"You going to the Dark Margin?" Axel asked, frowning as he realized that such a thing was probably the _only _reason why the King would need a cloak.

King Mickey nodded. "Of course. Unless Ansem came back with you guys."

"No, he wanted to stay there so he couldn't cause harm," Roxas said.

Mickey closed his eyes and sighed deeply.

"Guilt can be such a heart-ravaging thing sometimes," he said quietly. "I shall have to talk to him." He took a sideways glance at a stack of papers on his desk. "When I can spare a moment."

Neither Roxas nor Axel knew what to say.

"Thank you for this news, though," Mickey said, looking up at them. "It is much welcome."

"No problem," Axel said with a shrug. "A promise is a promise, right?"

"Quite true," Mickey said with a nod.

"Well, we'd better be off," Axel said. "If I time it right, they'll be dinner in Hollow Bastion when I go there to ask Cid about tracking light corridors."

"Really, Axel?" Roxas asked, laughing.

Axel shrugged.

"See ya around!" Mickey said, smiling.

Roxas and Axel nodded and left the office before Axel activated the star shard.


	10. Cloud's Job

**Author's Note: **Sorry for the delay... I've been swamped with... stuff. Lots of stuff. Okay, now let's see if I can get all the important business down without forgetting anything.

_*thinks for a few minutes*_

Well, it would appear that I don't have any important business to attend to. I'm not gonna answer any questions at the moment, I'm saving up for a big Q/A blog within the next couple of days. (Maybe tomorrow if I have time.) Currently, I'm not even writing at the moment because all of my writing energy is going to the last two final papers of the semester. (Don't worry, I'll still be updating, I got REALLY ahead in November.)

* * *

><p>"Feel free to munch."<p>

xx

"So let me get this straight," Roxas said as they walked the streets of Hollow Bastion. "You're not merely just trying to find out about light corridors because some random person made one in front of you. You're trying to find a _girl_."

"I told you that you couldn't laugh," Axel said, not looking over at him.

Roxas scrunched his face up so it wasn't even noticeable that he was smiling.

"What is she like?" he found himself asking.

"Very strong-willed," was Axel's response after a bit.

"Seems fitting," Roxas said, shrugging. "So is that why you didn't want to be around me and Xion today?"

"Basically."

"We can try not to… well, be like Sora and Kairi when we're around you."

"I'd like to see you try," Axel said. "But I appreciate the offer."

"Oh come on, we're not that bad," Roxas said. "And we're not _nearly _as bad as Riku and Namine!"

Axel snorted. "Now _there's _a couple that just needs to kiss and get it over with."

Roxas laughed.

They had arrived at the Restoration Committee Headquarters. Axel knocked on the door. Both he and Roxas were a tad surprised to find Cloud answering it.

Cloud took one look at the two of them, nodded gruffly and let them inside.

"Aerith, you have visitors," he called out.

"Actually, I'm here to talk to Cid," Axel said.

"Correction," Cloud said. "Cid, _you _have visitors."

"This had better be important!" Cid called from the back of the house.

"If it weren't important, I doubt they'd be here," said a new voice.

Axel and Roxas turned to see a blonde woman with glasses sitting casually at the table drinking tea. Next to her sat Rinoa and Leon.

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Cid said, coming out. He wiped his hands on a towel and tossed the towel onto the table. Leon grimaced a tad and swatted it away a bit.

"Merlin, you leave my computer alone!" Cid shouted back into the back before turning to Roxas and Axel. "What can I do fer ya?"

"Do you know what a light corridor is?" Axel asked.

Deciding that he didn't want to listen to this conversation again, Roxas turned to look at the woman he didn't know.

"Do you mind if I take a seat?" he asked her.

She gestured to the seat next to her. Roxas nodded and sat down.

"I'm Roxas," he said.

"Quistis," she replied. "Pleased to meet you. Do you already know Rinoa?"

Roxas nodded. "She and Leon helped us during the World that Never Was clear up."

Rinoa smiled. Leon merely just made an agreeing gesture.

"So what's this about corridors of light?" Quistis asked. "Cid appears to have heard of them, but I never have. And I've heard of a lot of things."

"They're old," Rinoa said. "Old and hard to control, from what I hear. Teleportation is much easier."

"And magic-consuming," Leon said.

Rinoa shrugged. "Perks of a Sorceress."

"Roxas said you were working on being able to track star shards," Axel was saying.

"Well, sure," Cid said, putting a piece of straw in his mouth to chew on while he thought. "Though it's taking a backseat to my darkness tracker. Star shards are highly unpredictable if they're not used right. But, if I'm in the area, I can get a general idea of where one's gone off to if it hasn't been too long. I'm better at figuring out where they came from. For example, you guys came from Disney Castle."

Roxas was impressed. If Axel was, he didn't show it.

"Could you track a light corridor?" he asked.

"Now I've studied every common way of transp'rtation I ca' think of: Gummi ships, airships, star shards, the Lanes Between, telep'rtation, even dark corridors. But I have no clue about light corridors, do ya wan' to know why?"

"Sure."

"'Cause jus' abou' no one uses them anymore! I've never seen one myself, only hear' whispers of their existence."

"They exist," Axel said.

"I don' doubt it. But there's nuthing I coul' do unless I saw one. And I'd have to have the righ' equipment there. It's more trouble than i's worth."

"Ah well, worth a shot in asking," Axel muttered.

"Why d'ya ask?"

"He's…" Roxas began, but Axel silenced him with a look.

"Curiosity," Axel said.

"Don' believe ya."

"There'sagirl," Roxas coughed.

Rinoa and Quistis laughed. Leon smiled a little. Cloud, who had gone over to a couch to sit, snorted. Cid merely raised his eyebrows.

"Twitterpated," he muttered, then turned around. "Aerith, you call me back out when dinner's ready!'

"Of course!" Aerith called from the kitchen. She stepped out into the front room and looked at Axel and Roxas. "Will you two be staying for dinner?"

Axel nodded vigorously.

"He was hoping you'd ask," Roxas said, jerking his thumb in Axel's direction.

Axel shrugged.

"Well of course you're welcome, pull up seats. It'll be ready in ten or fifteen minutes."

Axel sat down on the other side of Quistis. Aerith disappeared back into the kitchen.

"Blasted Magician!"

Cid's shout permeated the entire house.

"I had better go see what's going on," Cloud said, getting up.

"Oh, will you?" Aerith said, peeking her head back out of the kitchen. "Tifa and I are a little occupied at the moment."

Cloud had already disappeared into the back of the house.

"What do you suppose happened?" Roxas asked.

"Merlin's blowing up Cid's things again," Leon replied, shrugging.

"Does Merlin always blow up Cid's things?" Roxas asked.

"No, sometimes Cid blows up Merlin's."

Roxas and Axel laughed.

The front door banged in. Yuffie didn't even enter the house. She just stood there in the doorway, her hand laid out on the door to keep it open.

"I don't want to work with Zell anymore!" she said, rather loudly. "He's a klutz and gets into way too much trouble."

"And you're telling us this, why?" Quistis asked.

"Aerith!" Yuffie shouted. "I need your help healing him!"

Quistis and Rinoa both stood up. Aerith came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron as she did so.

"Yuffie, I could probably…" Rinoa said.

"No, it has to be Aerith," Yuffie said.

"Rinoa, can you go help in the kitchen, then?" Aerith asked, grabbing her staff.

"Sure," Rinoa said, folding her wings against her back as she slid past Aerith to get into the kitchen.

"I'm coming too," Quistis said, picking up her whip from off the table.

Yuffie rolled her eyes. "Sure, whatever. Just so long as we've got Aerith…"

Quistis decided that she wasn't going to take that as an insult. It wasn't worth it.

"Yuffie," Aerith said as they rushed out the door. "Why didn't you mention Zell was hurt at the beginning?"

They didn't hear Yuffie respond.

Leon looked back at the kitchen. "Only in this house is dinner just as important as healing someone."

"When you have this many people," Tifa said, coming out with a basket of bread. "It is."

Cloud came back out. "Cid and Merlin are fine. Though Cid might not have eyebrows. I'm not exactly sure how that's possible considering they're _only _working with software…"

He rolled his eyes and took a seat next to Leon. He grabbed for a bread roll, but Tifa smacked his hand away.

"Wait for everyone else!" she chided.

Cloud rolled his eyes and waited for her to go back into the kitchen before grabbing one anyway. Leon stifled a snort.

"Cloud, I know you're eating one!" Tifa called from the kitchen.

Cloud glared at Leon.

Roxas burst out laughing.

"So who's injured," Cloud asked, swallowing before he did so it wouldn't be entirely obvious that he'd taken a roll.

"Zell," Leon said. "I'm not surprised."

Cloud frowned. "It'd have to be bad if Yuffie only wanted Aerith though. Rinoa and Quistis are perfectly capable of healing him…"

"Yuffie didn't seem to be in that big of a rush," Roxas said.

Cloud's eyes went wide. He shoved the rest of the roll in his mouth and pushed back from the table with enough force to rattle the teacups. Leon instinctively held onto his, as if he were used to things rattling the table.

As soon as the china had stopped rattling, Cloud was standing in the door of the kitchen.

"Tifa!" he said.

"You stole a roll," she replied.

"Tifa! This is important! We need to go follow after them!"

"Cloud, why in the world… do you think there's still Heartless about?"

Cloud didn't respond verbally, but after about five seconds, Tifa exclaimed: "Oh!"

Without saying anything else, both of them rushed out of the door.

"Squall!" Rinoa yelled.

"I'm not good at cooking!" he replied.

"Yes, but everyone else is busy, so just get in here!"

He rolled his eyes, and got up from the table. Very slowly he made his way to the kitchen.

"Thank you!" she said when he'd finally gotten there.

"So, should we go follow after the crazy people, or should we just wait here until they all get back?" Axel asked.

Roxas shrugged. "Whatever works for me. But I have no clue where they've gone off to."

"Good point," Axel said, turning so he could lie back on the bench. "We'll just stay here then."

Rinoa brought a platter of vegetables to the table.

"Feel free to munch," she said. Then she returned to the kitchen.

"Get the feeling that there's something more going on right now?" Leon asked.

She nodded. "I have a good feeling about it though."


	11. The Road Heroes Tread

**Author's Note: **I am completely sorry that I fell off the face of the planet for like... four days. Or more. Or something. I don't even remember. It's probably closer to a week now. My EngLit exam basically stole my soul with how much studying I had to do for it. But now it's over. (Plus, I spent the whole weekend at my boyfriend's... which essentially meant limited internet because my laptop and his wifi don't talk to each other. Go figure.)

I got the Q/A up on the blog. I will be answering questions about how FF7 and my KHverse work together shortly. I wanted to get this chapter up before I discussed anything heavily FF-related and you'll see why as soon as you're done reading it.

Again, sorry it took so long for me to get this up. I shouldn't be putting you through this again anytime soon. I have loads written I just need to send it to the beta and then go on a posting spree :P

Enough of my meaningless rambling. Enjoy what is probably one of my favorite chapters so far :)

* * *

><p>"Crap. Xion wanted us home for dinner."<p>

_xx_

"He's just this way," Yuffie said, running throughout the various streets.

"What happened?" Aerith asked.

"I can't explain it," Yuffie replied. "You'll see when we get there."

"Zell, what have you done to yourself?" Quistis muttered.

The three of them turned a corner and Aerith gasped.

Zell was perfectly fine. In fact, he was doubled over laughing he was so fine. Standing next to him (well, if you could call it standing, he was more of leaning casually against the wall,) was Zack.

"See?" Yuffie exclaimed.

"Hi," Zack said, waving.

Aerith walked right up to him…

…and proceeded to whack him over the head with her staff.

"I deserved that," he replied.

"That is for having Yuffie lie to me," she said. She whacked him again. "That is for not coming to my house yourself!" She whacked him again. "That is for being gone so long. That is for not calling beforehand! That is for not calling often enough. That is for…"

xx

Cloud and Tifa had gotten rather good at running very fast.

"Do you really think it's him?" Tifa asked.

"It would fit, don't you think?" he replied.

They caught up to the other five just as Aerith began to whack Zack over the head. Cloud brought himself to a stop and burst out laughing at the sight of little Aerith whacking Zack with her staff. Tifa just clapped excitedly at the sight of the dark haired mercenary.

When Aerith paused for a longer breath, (or maybe it was just something else to beat him for), Zack interrupted…

"So, I know you're very intent on giving me a headache. But I was wondering what your plans were this evening, because I kinda want to go on a date."

"Oh, Zack," Aerith said, reaching up to hug him.

He grinned like a stupid fool and hugged her back.

When she pulled away, Zack looked over her shoulder at Cloud.

"Yo, Cloud! Good to see you're in town! Did you take care of your Sephiroth-problem?"

Cloud's scrunched up face was the answer.

"Right, well, I'm sure you'll get him. You seem to be fine right now. You'll beat him gone for good before he can cause too much trouble."

Cloud grunted a reply.

"Dinner's almost ready," Aerith said.

"Oh, good!" Zack said, patting his stomach. "I'm starving. What'd you make?"

"Roast beef, mashed potatoes, vegetables, bread…"

"You had me at 'roast,' let's eat!"

The group of them began walking back to the Headquarters. Zack put his arm around Aerith. He even offered to carry her staff for her, but she said that wouldn't be necessary.

When they got back, Aerith set her staff next to the door and Zack put his giant Buster Sword next to Cloud's sword and Leon's gunblade in the corner. Aerith introduced Zack to all the people he didn't already know and it took all of five minutes for Zack and Axel to get into a 'friendly discussion' (argument) on the benefits of different weapons in battle. It probably would have gone better if they had similar opinions on what was the best battle tactics. However, Zack was a 'hack-and-slash, brute force' kind of person, while Axel was more of an 'elude and outsmart' kind of person.

Aerith made her way back to the kitchen to help Rinoa and Squall bring food out. Tifa went to go fetch Merlin and Cid. Cloud got the honors of taking Zack's stuff upstairs to the room he'd be sleeping in: Leon's along with both Leon and Cloud.

"It's a good thing we got more beds," Quistis observed.

"After that mess when Aqua, Terra and Ven stayed over," Zell said.

"Well that was also because we happened to show up on the same day," Quistis said.

"That and Cid's moved to the basement," Leon said, bringing the platter of roast beef. "It's a wonder he ever gets any sleep with his work right there."

"I do too get sleep!" Cid argued, coming out of said basement, Merlin and Tifa right behind him.

"Oh goodness gracious, it appears Zack has joined us," Merlin said, straightening his glasses. "And Axel and, Ven?"

"Roxas," Roxas said. "I understand the confusion though. I don't think we've actually met…"

"No, I'm afraid we haven't. I'm Merlin the Wizard."

"Roxas, Keyblade Wielder."

"So many of them these days it seems," Merlin said.

"Well, after everything that Xehanort did, it's really no surprise," Cloud said, coming back downstairs.

"There," Aerith said, setting a stack of plates on the table. "That's everything, dig in!"

The table, though it didn't appear to be able to seat thirteen people, sat thirteen people quite comfortably. When Roxas asked on how this was possible, Merlin explained that he had magicked the table to seat as many people as Aerith happened to have over that day. Especially with Rinoa, Quistis and Zell staying for an extended period of time, it seemed to help. Though, they weren't really in a position to allow for people to stay overnight anymore. Zack had taken the one remaining bed and that only left the two couches and various floor space. Even Merlin had donated his two cots to Aerith's house for the cause and he was out of room.

"Everyone just likes to stay here," Aerith said. "And I simply can't say no."

"Zell and I are really only staying until Hollow Bastion is restored once and for all," Quistis added. "Then we'll be off again. I have a teacher's position waiting for me back at home."

"I'm just a mercenary," Zell said. "So it doesn't particularly matter."

"What about you?" Roxas asked, looking at Rinoa.

She shrugged. "Wherever Squall is, really."

Leon flushed bright red.

"Zack," Aerith said, placing a hand on his arm to get his attention. "How long are you planning on staying?"

"I'm just saying that a large sword can mean many one-hit kills for many monsters…hold on just a sec," he held up a finger, gesturing that Axel wait on a rebuttal.

"However long you want me to," he told Aerith with a cheesy grin. "The best part about being a mercenary is that I pretty much am my own boss of what jobs I pick up. Does Hollow Bastion Restoration pay well?"

"If you steal from the Heartless it does," Yuffie said.

"See? It's a living," Zack said with a shrug. "Plus I can help keep an eye on Cloud here." He jerked a thumb in Cloud's direction. Cloud frowned at Zack over his forkful of mashed potatoes.

"Cloud's doing just fine," Tifa said.

"Still got a Sephiroth problem, though," Zack said. "If he'd just let us help…"

"Let's not argue this over the table," Aerith said firmly.

Zack rolled his eyes. Cloud looked relieved.

"Sephiroth problem?" Roxas found himself asking.

"Product of getting too close to the darkness," Cloud said gruffly.

"Oh, so like Sora's Shadow," Roxas said, understanding.

"_What?_"

The whole rom had gone silent. There wasn't even the sound of dishes clinking together. Every single person in the room had frozen. Even the people who didn't know Sora personally were still.

Roxas looked around, his own fork halfway to his mouth, a piece of roast beef dangling from it.

"Oh, sorry, parallel universe."

"What?" Axel repeated.

"Don't you… oh yeah, you weren't there for that conversation."

"What conversation?"

"Right after we cleared out The World That Never Was. You'd gone off on your own after we got ice cream. I got back to the islands to find that Xion, Namine and Kairi had gone to a parallel Hollow Bastion. The Sora in that universe had a Shadow-like creature whose job is to drag him back down into darkness. He and Namine got into a battle of the wits."

Most everyone still seemed confused.

"Parallel universe?" Zell asked. "Those exist?"

"Well sure they do," Cid said. "What's interesting is that the three girls got there and got back to tell the tale. Something must be connecting the two universes for travel like that to be possible."

"Oh, Kairi mentioned something about a Riku Replica…"

"Okay, and I thought _I _was keeping secrets," Axel said. "The three of them went to a _parallel universe _and didn't think to tell _me_? Xion should've…"

"You were too busy researching light corridors."

Axel made a noise that sounded something between a stifled grunt and an exasperated whine.

"So, basically, they went to a parallel universe, where that Sora has a Sephiroth-like entity?" Tifa summed.

"From my understanding. You'd really have to ask Namine, she was the only one who could see him."

"Not very strong yet, then," Cloud muttered.

"We're off-topic," Zack said. "Cloud and his…"

"Not at the table!" Aerith repeated.

"Fine," Zack said. "Sorry. Me and Cloud'll have this argument tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Tifa asked, frowning. "I wouldn't be surprised if the two of you went outside right now to argue it out. And it'd last all night too…"

"Nah," Zack said, shaking his head. "Tonight I'm taking Aerith on a date!"

"Do you have someplace in mind?" Aerith asked.

"Just a little place I saw with flowers that bloom in the dark," Zack said.

Aerith beamed like a little schoolgirl.

Yuffie made gagging noises.

There was no more talk of shadows and Sephiroth-problems as dinner progressed. Rather, Zack and Axel returned to their discussion on weapons and most everyone felt the need to add their opinion as well.

Cloud and Leon agreed with Zack, though Leon also agreed that strategy was always a good thing.

Yuffie agreed with Axel, even though she didn't particularly want to.

Aerith, Rinoa and Quistis added in a tidbit on the benefits of magic. Tifa and Zell agreed with Axel when it came to quick action, but they agreed with Zack when it came to 'in your face' action. Cid agreed with them, but he said that there should be more force behind it. That then led to an argument about force.

"Aren't you going to say something, my boy?" Merlin asked Roxas.

Roxas shrugged. "Keyblades are different," he said. "All of those elements are included in being a Wielder. And every Wielder has a different style. Heck, me and Sora even fight differently, and we're arguably two sides of the same person. I think everyone just fights differently. I don't think there's an overall more effective way. Look at the Organization! Everyone just fights in a way that's best for them."

Most everyone had stopped arguing to listen to Roxas talk.

"Now_ that's _insightful," Cid said.

"Agreed," Leon said.

The discussion seemed to be settled after that.

Tifa volunteered herself and Cloud for cleanup that evening. Aerith ran upstairs to grab her coat so she and Zack could get going with their date. Leon, Rinoa and Quistis all set out to do the latest rounds of Hollow Bastion. Cid disappeared back into his basement. Merlin went back to his own house. Yuffie was content to lounge about on the couches and Zell made his way out to purchase something for his gloves.

"I'm glad you guys came to visit," Tifa said, looking at Roxas and Axel.

Roxas grabbed a few plates to help clean. Axel hadn't moved from his spot, looking very, _very _full.

"Sure," Roxas said. "It was nice."

"Aerith loves visitors," Tifa said. "Though today is a bit of a special day, anyway."

"Zack doesn't visit often?"

"Zack has a habit of getting himself involved with missions that last months at a time," Cloud said. "He visits when he can. Though he might just be staying a while this time around."

"He did say he'd stay as long as Aerith wanted him to," Roxas said.

"Which is forever," Tifa said. "But she won't tell him that. She knows he likes to be out there killing monsters."

"But he won't let her know he's restless," Cloud added.

"If only they would just…" Tifa began. "Oh! Cloud, here's a thought."

"That face generally means I don't want to hear it," Cloud muttered.

"Tell Zack you want help with your darkness."

"What, so he'll stay for me?"

"It's enough of a mission, don't you think?" Tifa added. "And that'll keep him here for a while. Maybe long enough to…"

"Fine," Cloud said. "But I can't say I'll like it."

"You don't have to. This is for Zack and Aerith."

Roxas tried to figure out the dynamic between Tifa and Cloud, but he couldn't quite grasp it. He couldn't tell if they were together… or what… But there was something.

Then he remembered something…

"Crap. Xion wanted us home for dinner."

"Aw man," Axel muttered. "Oh well, what's she going to do?"

"Be angry."

"You'll get over it."

Roxas turned to Tifa, who had started running water in the sink.

"We should probably go," he said.

"All right, visit again soon!"

"Of course!" Roxas said. He walked over to Axel. "Come on, you."

"I'm too full to move."

"You're moving anyway," Roxas said, grabbing onto Axel's shoulder and activating the star shard.

Axel stumbled to get to his feet when they landed in Destiny Islands. "Way to make that the most awkward exit ever."

"You said you didn't want to move."

"Bet you didn't think about the landing."

"Well…no…"

"You're hopeless!"

* * *

><p>So, I'm surprised not all that many of you caught onto the "it has to be Aerith" thing. I thought that was pretty obvious. I mean, it HAD to be Aerith because of Zack, not because Aerith was the only one who could "heal" Zell (who didn't need to be healed at all, it was just a ploy that Zack set up to surprise Aerith.) But anyway. *shrug* Ah well, Zack's here. If any of you have any wonderful questions about Zack and whyhow he's alive/differences between mine and rar's 'verse.../all that jazz... drop a question in a review and I'll probably answer it on the blog because it may be a long story.

Oh, and yes, I'm aware that there is a slight continuity issue with the Buster Sword. I'm working on it. Because, Zack has the real one. But, Cloud kinda does too. Cloud's is just the KH version of it, Zack has the FF7 version. Zack's is also the one called the Buster Sword. Cloud's can be called Fenrir or something for all I care. Or, it's just a sword. With bandages on it. For fun.


	12. Face it!

**Author's Note: **Hey! Another chapter for you all! I'm DONE with all my finals. Now it's just packing (of which there is a lot of because I have to pack my entire apartment (not fun.) Plus there's still paperwork... there's always paperwork. Anywho, enough of my personal ramblings.

All questions regarding the fic and characters will be answered in the Q/A sessions I put up on my blog every 5 chapters or so, that way the answer is in one place and I have room to expand on it. The one exception will be for questions in regards to continuity in the chapter or something that I (even after several proofreads by multiple people) left out. Hey, it happens.

Anyway, after all that lovely hype with Zack, now let's go on to what Roxas and Xion are doing the next day...

* * *

><p>"Are you two gonna help or what?"<p>

xx

"So I know you're probably still mad at me…" Roxas began, walking up to Xion.

"For the last time, Roxas," she replied, turning to look at him. "I'm not mad at you from yesterday."

"We didn't make it home for dinner though."

She shrugged. "I half wasn't expecting you to. I mean, sure, I got a little worried when you guys had been gone all day and the last place I had known you'd gone off to was the Dark Margin, but I reasoned that you two could take care of yourselves, regardless of what happened. You didn't even run into any Heartless."

"Well, I'd still like to make it up to you."

"Really? How?"

"Come with me, I want to go get all my sea-shells from The World That Never Was."

She smiled. "Okay!"

"And, while we're there, we can make sure the levels of Heartless and Nobodies are in check."

"Sounds like a great way to spend the day!"

"Let me go grab a star shard, I'll be right back."

"I'll be here," she replied, leaning up against a wall.

Roxas darted back to his and Sora's house. He jumped the back fence, heading for the back door. He passed Sora who was lazing in a hammock.

"Where are you rushing off to?" Sora asked.

"Xion and I are going to The World that Never Was."

"Odd place for a date."

"I never said it was a date."

"What are you going to be doing there?"

"Getting the sea-shells that she got for me."

"Yeah, that's a date."

Roxas frowned. "We'll be killing enemies too."

"And you two are the couple that just does stuff like that on dates. Have fun!"

Roxas wasn't sure of what to make of this, but went to go get the star shard anyway.

xx

"Sora told us to have fun," he said when he ran back to Xion.

She shrugged. "All right."

"Ready?"

She grabbed his hand.

He activated the star shard.

The two of them arrived just outside The Castle That Never Was, their ears ringing.

"You know," Xion said, shaking her head to clear out the buzz. "I have to appreciate the lack of negative effects dark corridors have."

"That you can physically notice," Roxas pointed out.

"True. So the sea-shells are in your room?"

He nodded.

"Time to storm the castle!" she exclaimed, running up.

He laughed and followed after her.

"Where'd you get that line?"

"Read it in a book that Riku's mom had lying on the coffee table."

"When do you have time to read?"

"I need less sleep than all of you. The other night I wasn't tired at all, so I wandered down to the living room to see if there was anything of interest and I stumbled across this book. I read it in one sitting. Riku's mom didn't seem to particularly mind, not after I told her I didn't need as much sleep, at least."

"What'd she say?"

"Well, first she joked that I must _really _not need sleep if I need less sleep than Riku. Then she said I was welcome to help myself to any of the books on the bookshelves and if there was anything in particular that I wanted, she'd try and get it for me."

"That's really nice."

Xion nodded. "She's awesome."

"Sora's parents are nice too. Though I have to laugh at all the things they don't know."

Xion looked at him, a curious expression on her face.

"Well, unlike Riku, Kairi and Sora don't tell their parents everything. Kairi doesn't tell her parents every detail because she's afraid that they won't let her go out anymore."

"Understandable, I suppose," Xion said.

"Sora isn't afraid that something like that'll happen. However, he only tells his parents what he thinks is interesting or important, or stuff that they explicitly ask about. So, a lot falls through the cracks. Like, when I mentioned that he'd been turned into a Heartless, they freaked out—not because he'd been turned into a Heartless, but because he hadn't told them himself."

Xion laughed.

All the while, the two of them had been making their way through The Castle. By this point, they'd showed up at Proof of Existence.

"Look at the colors," Xion said.

A lot of the glowing plates were red. Xemnas' was a pitch black mess. However, quite a few of them were blue. Xigbar's was blue, Zexion's (although mostly smashed) was blue, Axel's was blue, Demyx's, Luxord's, Marluxia's and Larxene's were all blue. Roxas' glowed nearly white it was so blue. Xion's (though also smashed) glowed the same color as Roxas'.

"Xigbar's still alive?" Xion asked.

"Yeah, he disappeared before I…" Roxas frowned. "I'm glad I didn't kill him, to be completely honest. I was just angry that he kept shooting at you."

"I don't remember…ah. I was still passed out, wasn't I?"

Roxas nodded.

"Zexion's still alive," Roxas said. "Somehow Xehanort never got to him after he betrayed him."

"That's good. I liked Zexion, he wasn't mean to me."

"I knew about Demyx and Luxord," Roxas mused.

"Don't you mean The Amazing Demetrius?"

They laughed.

"Lovely, Marluxia and Larxene are still around," Roxas said. "Axel must have just sent them away from Castle Oblivion."

Xion wrinkled her nose. "Larxene was mean."

"Tell me about it."

"You don't even _want _to know what all she did to Sora and Namine and the Riku Replica in Castle Oblivion," Xion said quietly.

"How much _did _you find when you hacked the system?"

"More than I ever would have wanted to know."

"Right, let's just go to my old room. This place is starting to creep me out."

Xion nodded and the two of them made their way to a pitch black hallway.

"So many X's," Xion mused when they got to the Hallway of Bedrooms.

"Yeah, and this is after Axel took down the ones over yours and Zexion's rooms."

Xion grimaced.

Roxas walked up to his door and unlocked it with his Keyblade. The two of them walked in. The room was the same as Roxas last remembered seeing it: through Sora's eyes back when they came and destroyed Maleficent.

"He left my closet door open," he muttered. "Though, I suppose we were in a rush."

"Where are the shells?" Xion asked.

"Bedside table drawer," Roxas replied.

"Right."

She went over to the bedside table and pulled open the drawer.

"Goodness, you have a lot," she said.

"You gave them all to me," he replied.

"Really?"

He nodded.

"Oh, well then."

"You sound surprised."

"Well, I brought you a shell each day that you were asleep," she said. "Seeing all of these shells reminds me of how many days you were asleep."

Roxas shrugged. "I'm rather proud of the collection. They make me think of you. It's a wonder I left them behind."

Xion could hazard a guess as to why they had been left behind—he hadn't remembered her at that point. She didn't point that out to him however. She didn't hold it against him.

Roxas scooped the shells into his pockets.

"Ha!" he exclaimed. "They just fit."

Xion laughed.

"Ooh, while I'm here," she said.

"What?"

"I'll grab a couple more cloaks. Kairi has just enough if me, her, and Namine all want to use one at the same time. I want to grab spares."

"You anticipating needing the cloaks?"

She shrugged. "You never know, and they are quite helpful."

"Well, go for it, then."

"Be right back."

"I'm done here, so I'll come too."

They both walked across the hall. Xion opened the door with her Keyblade and walked straight to her closet.

"Kairi left the door open," she observed.

"Well, we were trying to do as much as possible before Maleficent noticed."

"Makes sense, I suppose," she said, grabbing three more cloaks.

"I think we're done here, no?"

"We're good."

The two of them walked back into the hallway and ran right into a half a dozen stray Berserkers. It took them all of three seconds to have their Keyblades summoned. Xion dropped the spare cloaks to the floor.

"Combo?" Xion asked, holding out her hand.

Roxas grabbed it. "Light!" he shouted.

The two of them began glowing with white-hot light.

"Let's do this," Xion said.

They separated. Bathed in light, the two of them darted among the Berserkers, slashing through them with increased strength. Within a couple of minutes, all the Berserkers were gone.

"That was almost too easy," Xion said, the aura of light around her fading.

"Let's not complain," Roxas said, banishing his Keyblade. "There could be more."

"Should we stay and try and get rid of some more?" Xion asked.

"We just cleaned house here the other day," Roxas said. "I don't see a need to do it again. However, if you want to kill some monsters, do you want to head over to Hollow Bastion? Leon said they're in need of some help right now."

"I'm game," Xion said. "Just so long as they're enemies I can see, I don't particularly care."

"What's that a reference to?" Roxas asked, pulling out the star shard.

"The Shadow in the parallel universe. I couldn't see him. I couldn't even hear him most of the time. It was very annoying."

"Sounds like it," Roxas said. "I wonder if I'd be able to see or hear him, since I'm a part of the Sora in this universe."

Xion shrugged. "Arguably, I am, and I couldn't see a thing."

"Maybe it's a replica thing."

She rolled her eyes. "I remember Aerith saying it had something to do with darkness."

"Oh, so how come Namine could see him?  
>Xion shrugged. "She knows enough about darkness to sense it? No, wait, I think it had something to do with the fact that she sees memories."<p>

"Oh, that makes sense. Are you bringing those cloaks?"

He gestured to the cloaks behind her.

Xion turned around and scooped up the cloaks and nodded decisively. "Shall we go kick some enemy-butt?"

"I think we shall!"

He activated the star shard once again. As soon as they had landed in Hollow Bastion, they shook their heads to clear their ears.

"I will get used to this one day," Roxas vowed.

Xion laughed.

"Hey! Watch out!" Yuffie yelled, coming up behind them.

On instinct, the two of them ducked. Roxas looked up and saw a Phantomtail flying overhead. Yuffie's shuriken flew by and whacked it on the side. It dropped some munny and Yuffie wasted no time in gathering it up.

"Are you two gonna help or what?" she asked.

Xion dropped the cloaks again and the two of them summoned their Keyblades.

"Good practice, don't you think?" he asked.

She nodded, grinning.

The two of them ran off to help Yuffie.


	13. Scythe of Petals

**Author's Note: **Wow, just had a HUGE flurry of stuff over the past couple of days. Moving is a bear. And I'm gonna have to do it all again in a month. (Except, it's less furniture and more shipping the things I can't fit into suitcases.) Anywho, here is the chapter I wanted to have up last night but it just didn't happen.

A bit of trivia for you: Sora, Roxas, Xion and Ven can all summon each other's Keyblades once they are on the battlefield. However, they cannot summon one when it's in another's hands. The Keyblade has to be free-floating.

* * *

><p>"And you're getting distracted."<p>

xx

Shortly after one star shard disappeared from the Hallway of Bedrooms, another one appeared. This one was accompanied with a hooded man. He took down his hood and shook out his hair.

"That wasn't so hard, was it?" he mused to himself.

He walked pretentiously to the bedroom door right next to one of the ones that Roxas and Xion had been in moments previously. It had a scythe on it—a very menacing-looking scythe at that.

He frowned at the glowing black-and-white X shimmering across his door. He knew what that X meant—don't go somewhere. He frowned, Xemnas was gone. So was Xehanort if the rumors were true. How did someone have enough power to _permanently _put one of these things up?

He frowned, trying to see if he could get around this predicament. He tried placing his hand through the X, but an invisible barrier stopped his hand from getting closer than four inches from the door. He tried several different areas of the barrier.

There was no getting through.

He summoned his scythe and tried to hack through the barrier.

All he managed to do is look rather awkward trying to chop through an invisible barrier alongside the reinforced walls of the Castle that Never Was.

He banished the scythe and resummoned it, this time using the flower petals that came with it to pelt into his door in a predetermined pattern.

The petals went through the barrier and his door swung open quietly.

He banished the scythe again and gave a curt nod. He then proceeded to walk into his room.

And then fail, because the barrier was still intact.

"I bet not even a Keyblade could get through this," he muttered sullenly.

What he needed, was the ability to erase the barrier. But that would require some power over darkness. He couldn't even form a dark corridor; there was probably no way that he could get rid of one of Xemnas' old barriers.

He tried, anyway, but nothing happened.

He swore.

To pour salt on the wound, his door closed on him.

He swore some more.

"Man that's a dirty mouth," came a _very_ familiar cocky voice.

Marluxia turned around to see Axel coming into the Hallway from the Grey Area.

"How long have you been here?" he asked.

"Just got here," Axel replied with a shrug. "I wanted to get some things out of my bedroom and I figured now's a good a time as ever. Of course, if I had known Roxas and Xion were going to come, I would have come with them. No matter."

Axel shrugged and walked up to his door. Snapping his fingers to light a little flame, he heated up his doorknob and his door clicked open.

Without saying another word to Marluxia, he went in. Marluxia shifted uncomfortably. He almost would have rather run into the wielders of the Keyblade. They probably didn't harbor enough hate towards him to kill him without a second thought. Axel, well, he had no flipping clue about Axel.

Axel was like that.

He thought about just leaving, but he didn't want to appear cowardly. He leaned against the wall next to his door, keeping an eye out for Axel when he came back out of his room.

He noticed a few more X's. There was one over Larxene's door, one over Demyx's door, one over Lexaeus' door, one over Vexen's door, and one over Xaldin's door. He raised his eyebrows at the lack of Zexion's door entirely, but didn't question it all that much. Zexion was an odd one.

Axel came back out of his room, shoving something in his pockets and closing the door behind him. Marluxia had to notice that Axel was not dressed in a black cloak, but rather a khaki pair of pants and a loose red, long-sleeved shirt.

"So, paranoid one," Axel said. "What are you doing here?"

"None of your business," Marluxia said stiffly.

"Nothing's changed then," Axel replied. He looked to the side of Marluxia and noted the X over the door.

"Stuck outside your room, buddy?" he asked.

Marluxia turned up a nose and looked pointedly away from the double-crosser.

"Nothing that you can do to help," he said.

Then he remembered, Axel could form dark corridors. Theoretically, Axel _could _help him.

Not that he was going to ask for help.

"You _are _stuck out of your room! Would you like some help?"

"Why do you even offer you double-crossing traitor?"

"Sheesh, must we call names? Not that I'm offended, I've been called worse and I've called others worse. But still, is that really necessary?"

"What are you playing at?"

"I asked if you wanted some help. You want into that room, but Xemnas' barrier is in the way. I have the ability to remove that barrier and I'm offering. I think it's a winning situation for you."

"What do you want in return?" Marluxia asked. "You're always after your own ends."

Axel shrugged. "Nothing in particular today. I'm in a good mood. Though, there is one thing you can do for me."

Marluxia raised an eyebrow. He had been expecting something like this.

"I want to see you open your door."

Marluxia frowned. Axel had a habit of laughing at what it took to open his door. He pursed his lips.

Was it worth it?

There were things in that room that he needed and Axel _was _being generous. But, he couldn't trust the pyro any farther than he could throw him (though he probably could throw the skinny git rather far if he tried). So perhaps that was a bad analogy. He couldn't trust the skinny git, leave it at that.

On the other hand, Axel had yet to shove him through a dark corridor. Or summon a weapon, or anything to indicate harm.

Perhaps the man was having a good day.

"Fine," Marluxia said through clenched teeth.

Axel walked across the hall and casually passed his hand over the shimmering X. It disappeared.

"How do you suppose Xemnas keeps these things up?" Marluxia found himself asking.

Axel shrugged. "Beats me. Maybe he wasn't the one to put them up. Maybe someone who's still alive put them up."  
>"Like?"<p>

"Oh, old Xiggy's still around."

Marluxia frowned.

"Well, go on then, open your door."

Grimacing, Marluxia summoned his scythe. He gathered up the petals accompanying the scythe and threw them at the door. They glowed pink as they hit the door in the pattern before disappearing. The door opened.

Axel was snickering.

"Your face!" he said.

Marluxia growled, walked into his room and started to slam the door behind him. Axel stopped the door with his foot. Begrudgingly, Marluxia noted a thick black boot.

"Now don't let me catch you causing problems later," he said. "I did you a favor. You'll remember it. Now I'm going to leave now before either of us try to kill each other. And I, at least, will have a good day."

Axel excused himself from Marluxia's room and Marluxia heard the distinct sound of a star shard leaving.

Marluxia found something haunting in Axel's last words: '_I did you a favor…you'll remember it…_'

Nevertheless, he made his way to his desk and began gathering things up.

xx

"Yuffie!" Zack yelled. "Knock that flying one this way and I'll get it."

"It's called a Wavecrest," Yuffie yelled back. "Get it right!"

Zack rolled his eyes. "Just knock it this way, will you?"

"Only if I steal from it first!"

Zack decided it wasn't worth it and went after a nearby Bully Dog. He killed it with one slash, which made him happy.

"Yuffie," Cloud said, going over to the girl. "Things might go better if you actually worked with the rest of us."

Yuffie's nose twitched. This was coming from Cloud.

"Things go just fine," she said. "We get all the Heartless. And it's been nearly two weeks since one of us got majorly injured."

"Yes, but don't you still think teamwork might make things easier?"

"Maybe."

Cloud dropped the subject after that. Yuffie decided that she was going to work with Roxas and Xion. They had yet to annoy her today.

"See, if you toss it like, _so,_" Roxas said, chucking his Keyblade. It went spinning amongst the horde of Rapid Thrusters that had decided to join the Bully Dogs and the assorted flying Heartless. "It's rather effective."

Oblivion came spinning back to him and he caught it easily.

Xion threw her own Keyblade, but it didn't go nearly as far as Roxas' had. Nor did it come back to her.

She sighed and went to go get it, again.

"Just summon it back," Roxas suggested.

"Oh, that's a good idea," she replied, doing so. "Why didn't you mention that five times ago?"

"Just thought of it," Roxas said, shrugging.

Xion sighed and tried again—to the same end.

"Try some more wrist-action," Yuffie suggested. "For best results, add a little Aero behind it."

Xion summoned her Keyblade back to her, bashed away a Rapid Thruster that had gotten too close to them. She threw her Keyblade again, whispering 'Aero' as she did so. The Keyblade went farther, and even thought about coming back. But it didn't.

"Well, that's the general _idea_," Yuffie said. "It's just getting it to come back."

"Obviously," Xion muttered.

She summoned it and tried again. Roxas and Yuffie looked on while batting away the bravest Rapid Thrusters. In an attempt to make Xion feel better, Roxas gave a little twitch of his wrist, pulling the Keyblade back to her.

He only partially expected it to work. It worked well. _Too _well. The Kingdom Key came back and whacked them both in the heads. Yuffie laughed at them.

"Roxas," Xion rubbed her head. "Don't _ever _summon my Keyblade like that again."

"Duly noted."

"Zack!" Cloud shouted.

The three of them looked over to the other two people who were helping on this little round of Heartless killing.

Zack had a giant gash on his forehead.

"Do you _not _know how to be careful?" Cloud asked. "How do you survive as a mercenary? You don't always have people around to Cure you!"

Zack threw up a Cura for himself. He didn't respond.

"You're showing off, aren't you?" Cloud asked.

Zack shrugged.

"For who?" Cloud asked. "Aerith's back in the house!"

"I never actually admitting to showing off," Zack said, wiping blood from his face with the back of his glove.

"You're totally showing off!" Cloud teased. "Bet it's for the newcomers! You just wanted them to see…"

As Cloud was talking, Zack maneuvered himself around the spikey blonde and killed a larger-than-normal Bully Dog.

"And you're getting distracted," Zack pointed out.

Cloud rolled his eyes.

"Boys," Yuffie muttered.

"Hey!" Roxas said, taking offense.

"Let it go," Xion said, chucking her Keyblade again. "It's not worth it."

This time, her Keyblade actually came back to her. She was so surprised she almost didn't catch it.

"Woohoo!" she exclaimed.

"All right, all right," Yuffie said, resting her shuriken on her shoulder. "Enough jokin' around. Let's kill these Heartless!"

"Combo?" Xion asked.

"Combo."


	14. A Wayfinder

**Author's Note: **Merry early Christmas! (Though, there is a HIGH likelihood that I will have at least ONE more chapter up before Christmas... but hey... whatevskis.)

HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN THE KH3D TRAILER YET? Go to rar's blog, she totally has it up there at the moment... like... OMG. I mean, you can also just search it on YouTube. Jump Fiesta long trailer. It's about 8 minutes. OMGAMAZINGNESS. Oh, however, if you are trying to avoid spoilers, I recommend not watching it.

Please don't leave speculations as reviews in regards to the game... either PM me, or leave a comment on my blog somewhere. (Just in case FF decides to start banning *spam*.) Or if people are trying to avoid spoilers. I'll put a blog post up on my blog with no spoilers in the actual post and all spoilery/speculative stuff can just be posted in comments to help people avoid spoilers.

Anyway, happy chapter about Wayfinders and Selphie having crazy ideas.

* * *

><p>"How do you know that's not going to happen later?"<p>

xx

Kairi sat along the beach, just above high tide. She was stringing together another set of Thalassa shells for her lucky charm. Next to her, sat a basket full of the rest of the shells. If she got to it today, she'd try and get all of them done. But she had a feeling that wasn't going to happen. If Sora came over, well, there was no chance of her getting done then.

"Hey, Kairi!"

Or if Selphie came over.

"I didn't even know you guys were back! I haven't seen you at school at all! Then I saw Riku at the market with his mother and I had to figure if he was back you were back. Of course, then I had to come find you. The blonde girl at your house said you'd come over here. She's really nice by the way…"

Deciding now was as good as any a time to interrupt the bubbling girl, Kairi said: "She's my sister."

Selphie plopped down next to Kairi and instinctively, Kairi moved the basket of shells to the other side of her, just so Selphie wouldn't nick one. Not that Selphie would do such a thing on purpose; but if she found one shiny enough and wanted to keep it for her own, Kairi wouldn't put it past her to take one.

"Your _sister_?" Selphie asked. "Do you mean that you guys went on that whole adventure just to…"

Kairi shook her head. "Finding Namine was just one part of it."

"Oh. What are you making?"

"A Wayfinder for myself," Kairi said.

"I thought you already…"

"I gave that one to Sora."

_And it happens to be his Keychain…_

"Shouldn't Sora make one for you then?"

Kairi laughed. "I love him and all, and he's great with a Keyblade, but I don't think he would be very good at making one of these."

"Keyblade? Those things of legend? Is _that _why Sora keeps having to leave?"

"And Riku," Kairi added. "And me."

Selphie gasped.

_Here goes…_

Kairi stuck the needle in her mouth and held out her right hand. She summoned her Keyblade. Selphie's eyes grew wide.

"It's beautiful," she whispered.

Kairi couldn't exactly disagree with her. The morning light of Destiny Islands illuminated the golds and bronzes until they shone. And the crystal blue sea reflected off of the waterfall on her guard. Even the little Paopu Keychain glimmered a little.

The best part about it was that it was her very own.

"Can your sister…?"

Kairi shook her head and banished the blade. "It's not genetic. Sora, Riku, Roxas, Xion and I are the only ones on Destiny Islands who can."

"Roxas and Xion?"

"They came home with us too."

"Where'd you find them?"

"It's a long story."

"We've got time!"

"It's not a very interesting story," Kairi said with a shrug. "Wouldn't you want to hear something more interesting?"

"Have you fought anything with your Keyblade?"

"More Heartless, Nobodies and Unversed than I can count."

_And that's not including the ones I fought with Sora's Keyblade…_

"What about people?"

Kairi nodded.

Selphie gasped. "Who?"

"Mostly Xehanort," Kairi said.

Selphie gave her a blank stare.

"Very evil man," Kairi summed up. "He's gone now."

Selphie gasped.

"Have you gotten injured?"

Kairi laughed as a few distinct images popped into her head: the time the giant Unversed knocked her to the ground, that time with Xigbar, that time the Xehanort Replica threw her off the cliff…

"Yeah, nothing too horrible though," Kairi said finally. "Sora and Riku always seemed to take the worst of it. Xion too, I suppose."

"What does that mean?"

"Sora has a habit of charging into things," Kairi replied, shaking her head. "Riku just goes until he can't anymore. And Xion just got really unlucky that one time."

Selphie looked like she was going to ask about that, but she didn't, to Kairi's relief. She wasn't particularly sure how she was going to explain Replicas to Selphie.

Selphie thought about her next question a minute before asking it.

"Does it mean you'll all leave again?"

Kairi didn't answer right away. She knew that the boys had figured they'd just be able to be based out of Destiny Islands. But what would happen when something big came up again? Like it invariably would. Someone like the Organization, or Xehanort, or Maleficent? They might have to go away again for a while. What if, someday, something prevented them from coming home for good?

It was a morbid thought.

She made a silent resolution that wherever Sora was, was where she wanted to be. Nothing else would matter after that.

"That's a yes, isn't it? But what about school? And getting a job? And having a family?"

Kairi laughed a little at the burst of questions.

"Selphie, remember how I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up? Ever? How I always gave the lame answer of a teacher or a nurse because I just never knew? Well, the Worlds have given me a job, and I don't need to go to school to do it. As for a family, I think that's still very possible in my line of work."

She paused, thinking about the deeper implications of her words.

"I've been meaning to ask," Selphie said. "Have you and Sora…?"

Kairi smiled. "Yes. I'm his girlfriend. Yes, we've kissed."

Selphie squealed.

Kairi barely noticed. She was too busy reminiscing on how oddly romantic it was for Sora to ask her as they were fighting large amounts of Nobodies. Not that was nearly as romantic as him jumping off a cliff after her. Selphie had begun to hum a childhood rhyme about kissing and trees. Kairi decided to ignore her.

"Aw," Selphie exclaimed suddenly. "Since you're not coming back to school, you'll miss the end-of-the-year dance!"

Kairi could remember a time when she had greatly looked forward to an event like this. She would wear a pretty dress, she would laugh at Sora's face when he saw her in it, she'd have the night of her dreams…

It seemed oddly trivial now.

She was rather pleased with the life she had been given. She was a Princess, though that was more of a status than a job. She was a Keyblade Wielder—_that _was a job. She was able to fight alongside Sora and travel the worlds. The sheer fact of being able to wield a Keyblade seemed to make everything else in her life fit into place.

She wondered if Sora and Riku ever felt the same way.

Selphie was now babbling on about either getting them into the school dance, or holding one separate outside of school.

"I'll talk to Sora and Riku about it," Kairi said.

Selphie seemed satisfied with that.

Kairi had to laugh internally at the thought of Xion dressing up for an event like a formal-ish dance. What was more interesting, was the thought of Riku's face when he saw Namine all dressed up. That would _definitely _be worth seeing.

"What will be worth seeing?" Namine asked, coming up behind them.

"No one said anything about…" Selphie began, looking up at the newcomer.

"Sister thing," Namine said, tapping her head.

_Sorry, I didn't realize Selphie was here…_

_ Don't worry about it._

"So what will be worth seeing?" Namine repeated.

"The look on Riku's face if he sees you dressed up for a school dance."

"What does Riku have to…?" Selphie began. Then her eyes grew wide. "_You're _dating Riku?"

Namine flushed bright red and nodded.

"But I thought Riku couldn't find a girl good enough for him…"

"I guess he did," Kairi said.

Namine turned redder.

"So, um, what's a school dance?" Namine asked.

"You don't know what a school dance is?" Selphie asked.

Namine slowly shook her head.

"How can you not?"

"I never went to school."

"How come?"

_Say you were homeschooled!_

"I was homeschooled."

"Ah."

"Good afternoon ladies!" Sora said, joining them. "Would someone like to explain why Namine is a lovely shade of pink?"

"Talking about Riku," Kairi said.

"Oh really! This I've gotta hear…"

"Sora!" Selphie exclaimed. "Wouldn't you want to come to the end-of-the-year school dance? Wouldn't that just be so much fun?"

Sora frowned. "Well, first of all, not all of us are students."

"Well, you and Kairi…"

Sora shook his head. "I'm not a student anymore."

Selphie stared at him blankly.

"Simply put, I'm not in their system anymore."

"How did that happen?"

"Okay, this is going to sound weird no matter how I put it." Sora frowned, thinking.

"Well, I already explained Keyblades, if that helps," Kairi said.

"Doesn't help much. Selphie, do you remember when everyone forgot about me?"

Namine grimaced. Kairi swatted at her.

Selphie frowned. "Um, sort of."

"My school records disappeared somewhere in there. I don't exist to them. And Riku's labeled as a dropout."

Namine snorted.

"Well that puts a damper on things…" Selphie mused. "Maybe if I talk to them."

"Kairi, have your _dad _talk to them."

"Oh," Kairi said slowly. "That might work."

"It probably will work," Sora said. "Get him to let all of us go. It'll make Selphie's day at least. And it'll give me a reason to tease Riku for dressing up."

Namine grinned. "Oh, but he'll look so wonderful!"

Only Kairi grasped that Namine had actually caught a glimpse of what Riku would actually look like come that night.

"We'll have to get you guys dresses!" Selphie said, bubbling with excitement. "I've already got mine."

"I think I know the place to get them," Kairi said. "Thank you though."

"Where?" Namine murmured.

"Aerith."

"Why would Aerith have dresses?"

_No offense, but I'm not the biggest fan of yellow flowery stuff…_

_ Ah!_

Selphie picked herself up. "I have to go tell Tidus and Wakka!" she exclaimed. Then she ran off.

Sora sat down in her place; however, he sat considerably closer to Kairi than Selphie had. Kairi leaned up against him, resting her head on his shoulder. Namine pulled out her sketchbook and some pencils and began drawing.

"Hollow Bastion?" she mused. "I thought they went to The World that Never Was."

"So did I," Sora said, looking over.

"How do you know that's not going to happen later?

"I just do. This is happening now."

Kairi and Sora exchanged glances. Some things about Namine's psychic drawing abilities made sense. Others did not. This was in the latter category. Neither of them bothered asking another question however. It might not have mattered, Namine was in her own world.


	15. Neverland Sky

**Author's Note: **Hmm, what to say, what to say? Well, certainly hello to the regulars! Especially those who participated in that WONDERFUL derailed debate about KH3D on rar's blog. That was fun! Anywhosawhatsit, I've got a wonderful new chapter for you of Namiku fluff. Well, it's not fluff per say, it's just Namiku. In Neverland! Riku promised he'd take her! And there's enemies! Okay, before I spoil the whole chapter... onto the reading!

* * *

><p>"My way's faster and you know it."<p>

xx

"Boo!"

"Hello," Namine replied, not even looking up from her drawing.

Riku rolled his eyes and sat down next to her.

"Not even the slightest bit startled?" he asked.

"I heard you coming."

He sighed and blew his bangs out of his face.

"What are you working on?" he asked.

"It's nothing much," she said. "It hasn't happened yet."

He looked over, cocking his head to one side.

"We're flying," he observed.

She nodded.

"Well isn't that ironic," he mused.

"Hmm?"

"I was just going to take you there."

She sat up straight, slamming her pencil into the sketchpad. He laughed at how big her eyes had gotten.

"I feel bad that I took so long to make time, but with everything else that's…"

"It's fine!" she interrupted. "Perfectly fine."

He laughed. "Excited, much?"

She blushed.

"Shall we go now?"

She nodded and put her sketchbook and pencils away.

He stood up and offered his hand out to help her do the same. Once they were both firmly on their feet, he pulled out a star shard and activated it.

They arrived on a small little cliff overlooking the sea.

"I could have done that better," Riku mused, looking out into the ocean. "Wouldn't want your sketches to get wet."

"Glad to see you don't care about me though," Namine teased.

"Well, I think, given the circumstances, you would be more worried about the sketchbook than you would yourself."

"I suppose that is true," Namine agreed.

"Now to find some pixie dust," Riku mused, looking around. "This way, I suppose."

He offered his hand out to Namine once more. She took it and he began leading her off.

"Do you have any idea where we're going?" she asked.

"I have a general idea," he said. "Frankly, we're not looking for a place, but Peter. Or at least Tinker Bell. I know where to go that will at least keep us out of the way of Hook."

A faint jingling sound got both of their attention.

"Tinker Bell!" Namine exclaimed, pointing up to the little flying pixie.

Tinker Bell turned around to look at them. She frowned.

"Oh, it's okay, I'm with him," Namine said.

Tink cocked her head to one side, processing this information. For starters, Namine had just answered a question she hadn't even asked. But, what she had said appeared to be true. She loosened up.

_"What do you want?" _the question was evident on her face.

"Do you think you could give us a little pixie dust, please?" Namine asked. "Well, Riku already has some, I think. But I would really like to fly and I was wondering if maybe you could be so kind as to…"

Tink responded by showering the two of them with golden pixie dust.

"Thank you so much!" Namine said.

Tink jingled.

"I like it too, thanks!"

Tink jingled once more.

"Happy thoughts, right!"

Tink nodded her head curtly and flew off, jangling as she went.

Riku scratched his head and looked over at Namine.

"You could understand her?"

"Well sure," Namine replied. "You couldn't?"

Riku shook his head.

"Oh, well then."

"What was that about liking something?" he asked.

"Oh, she likes my skirt because it's green."

"Ah. Well, no complaints from me. Shall we fly?"

She nodded and closed her eyes. She lifted her arms to the sides, letting the rest of her body relax. A grin slowly spread to her face and she began floating.

"Whoa there," Riku exclaimed, grabbing her ankle. He laughed.

She laughed as well, floating up higher. He pushed off the ground with his toes and joined her.

"Wait for me," he said, looking her right in the eye.

She giggled.

He grabbed her wrists and led her through the air.

"This is so much better in person!" she squealed.

He laughed.

"Do you want to try something fun?

"Maybe."

"Hold on," he said.

She gripped his wrists.

"Don't close your eyes!"

"I won't," she replied.

He spun them both about in the air. The two of them somersaulted several times. She squealed, he laughed.

"Ah! Lost a shoe!"

Riku pulled himself away from her and looked down. Her little silver flat had fallen to the ground below.

"Wait here, I'll get it," he said.

Before she had a chance to reply, he'd dived down to the ground to retrieve it. He picked it up, brought his feet underneath him, and pushed off the ground again.

"You should have worn the ones with the straps," he told her as he handed it to her.

She _fwaped _him with the shoe. "Those have ridiculous heels!" she said. "Not practical for sitting around on the beach and…"

"But you fought Heartless with them," he argued.

"Yes, but…" she sighed.

Riku's face flushed red.

"What?" she asked.

"Sorry. I was just going to say that you looked rather good in them but I figured that might not be…"

Namine was blushing too by that point.

"Well, maybe I will wear them more often. But they don't match the skirt I have on right now at all. So it'll have to be with something else."

Riku laughed. "Though, then I start worrying about you hurting yourself when you wear those and we're out fighting Heartless."

"I haven't fought anything but the smallest of Heartless since Castle Oblivion," Namine said. "Well, besides the Shadow, but that was more of a battle of the wits than a battle of the blades."

Riku frowned.

"I can take care of myself."

He still frowned.

She sighed. "Though, I like it when you're there to protect me."

He smiled.

She laughed and pulled the other shoe off her foot. She stowed both of them away in the satchel she carried around with her for her sketchbook and pencils.

"There, now I can't lose them again."

He laughed.

She did a somersault in midair just for the fun of it.

"This is just wonderful," she said, smiling.

He grabbed ahold of her shoulders, his bright blue eyes once more locking onto her darker ones. For a brief moment, time stood still.

Suddenly, there was a bright green-and-gold pixie in between them.

"Whoa, now, wait a second!" Namine said, rather forcefully. "Slow down!"

Tink glowered, but looked Namine right in the eye as she was trying to explain again.

"Cage, man in a red cape, a hook, Peter… no, Lost Boys… Hook has some of the Lost Boys?"

Tink nodded.

"Where's Peter?" Namine asked. "You don't know? So Hook has some of the Lost Boys, there's a cannon, and you don't know where Peter is?"

Tink nodded again.

"And you want us to help?"

Tink nodded, though only halfheartedly.

"Sounds like she doesn't want to admit it," Riku muttered.

Tink rounded on him and glared.

"Sheesh! Sorry!" Riku said, holding up his hands in defense.

"Where to?" Namine asked. "Show us!"

Tink took off in the direction of the ocean. Namine and Riku followed after.

"I was hoping to be able to avoid Hook," Riku muttered.

"Well, maybe it's a good thing we came, though," Namine reasoned. "With Peter missing and Hook messing with the Lost Boys…"

Riku's nose twitched. "The darkness is getting stronger."

"Can you smell it?"

He nodded. "Hook's darkness has gotten stronger."

Namine grimaced.

"Just what we _don't _need."

"All on his own, too," Riku continued. "Maleficent's not around to try and recruit him."

Namine stopped short, mid-flight. She frowned, hovering over the water, a thoughtful expression on her face.

Riku made a cross between an aggravated and a sympathetic noise and doubled-back. Tink noticed this and positively growled, though she was ignored by Riku and Namine.

"What are you thinking?" Riku asked.

"What if we could have fun with this?" Namine said.

"We're going up against Hook, whose darkness has been festering and growing significantly stronger since the last time we were here, and a cannon, along with however many Heartless manage to show up. Plus there's the problem that we don't know where Peter is and we have to rescue some of the Lost Boys. And you're suggesting we have fun with this?"

"Think about it, though," Namine said. "Do you reckon the darkness that we'll be going up against is any stronger than what Xehanort put us through?"

Riku sniffed. "Well, no. Not yet at least."

"What if we scare it out of Hook?"

Riku laughed. "I'm not sure it works like that."

"But still, you are stronger than Hook, are you not?"

Riku shrugged.

Namine rolled her eyes. "Just, let's go in there, appear out of nowhere, catch him off guard, and maybe we can get everyone out safely without having to slice anything up. If we're lucky, we might get this over with before Heartless even start showing up."

"Doubtful, but possible."

"And if they do show up, you're forgetting that I can get rid of several dozen of them without even breaking a sweat."

"So can I."

"My way's faster and you know it."

Riku didn't have an argument for her.

"Right, well, let's go for it," Riku said, drawing his blade. "It's a good idea as any."

"Have fun with it," Namine said.

"You're not going to be doing anything!"

"Oh sure I am! Outside of Heartless, I'm going to be racking everyone's brains for a clue as to where Peter is."

"Fine, you will be doing something."

Tink jangled angrily.

"We're coming!" Namine said, starting off again. Riku followed right after her.


	16. Riku

__**Author's Note: **Hey, everyone! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and whatnot! I sure did. Anywho, I would have had this chapter up earlier... but fanfiction wasn't letting me upload a document. . But, now I can, so I'm uploading it now :)

Nothing much to say about the chapter, really. It's part two of the Namiku in Neverland (doesn't that just have such a nice ring to it?) Sequence. There aren't any questions that need to be answered that haven't already been answered on my blog... (And now that I'm thinking about it, I owe you about THREE blog posts. One for this chapter, one for Namiku as a couple, and a Q/A post.)

Right... ONTO THE CHAPTER!

* * *

><p>"Take back what you didn't even say."<p>

xx

"Please don't hurt us," one of the Lost Boys whimpered, struggling against the ropes that tied him to the mast.

"Sheesh, man, you're supposed to be brave!" another one of the Lost Boys argued.

That didn't stop the other one from sniffling a little.

"Tell me where Peter is!" Hook demanded, pointing his sword at a third Lost Boy.

"We don't know!" he replied, his voice only shaking a little.

"Looking for someone?"

"Peter!" the Lost Boys cried.

Riku appeared out from behind one of the sails.

"Sorry to disappoint," he said, brandishing his blade.

He jumped down off the mast, and hovered just behind Hook, his blade placed carefully in the way of any possible route between Hook and him.

"It's _you _again!" Hook said, spinning around. "You're not working for _her_, are you? Because I am doing just fine by myself!"

Riku snorted. "I stopped working for Maleficent long ago. And she's _gone_."

Hook cringed.

Riku smirked.

The Lost Boys weren't sure whether or not to cheer.

xx

Meanwhile, Namine sat hidden behind the sail, prying through every memory she could grasp onto, seeing if she could find Peter. Tink sat on her shoulder, waiting for any word of what to do. She tinkled slightly every time she moved, but it was not loud enough to alert Hook or any of his men.

There was a distinct sound of Heartless appearing.

Namine sat up straighter. Tink's wings twitched.

Namine maneuvered her way over to where Riku had been standing mere moments before. She looked down at the ship deck below. Riku and Hook stood in the center, each had his blade pointed at the other. There were four Lost Boys tied to the other mast, which Riku and Namine had figured out before even showing up on the ship. Hook's men were mysteriously absent, though that wasn't to say that they wouldn't show up any minute now.

Ironically, the dozen or so Heartless that had shown up might just prevent that from happening. Namine would not put it past them to be a little cowardly.

Most of the Heartless were dark Neoshadows, though some of them were of the Pirate variety. Riku hadn't even taken any notice.

Namine focused on as many of them as she could, closed her eyes, and breathed out slowly. From the sounds that the Lost Boys made, she knew she had gotten rid of a good chunk of them. She opened her eyes and noticed that the only ones she had missed had been Neoshadows. They had collapsed into the ship, not that such a thing would stop her from getting them, but it certainly had interfered enough to save them momentarily.

They disappeared with a flick of her wrist.

Tinker Bell's appreciation for Namine increased exponentially.

xx

"Where have the Heartless gone?" Hook exclaimed. "They should be working for me!"

"Obviously I have friends in high places," Riku taunted.

Hook looked up, expecting to see Peter, but he didn't see anyone.

Riku laughed.

Hook growled and a few more Heartless appeared again.

"Oh, well then," Riku mused. "Someone's been dabbling in the darkness."

"You're one to talk," Hook spat.

The second batch of Heartless disappeared. Hook blanched.

Riku laughed again. "Look, since there's no way you can summon up _nearly _enough Heartless to defeat me, how about you just let the boys go and tell us where Peter is and I'll get out of your hair."

"If I knew where that blasted Pan was, I wouldn't have the four of _those _brats tied up to me ship!"

"Ah," Riku said, frowning.

_If he doesn't know where Peter is, then where _is _Peter?_

Out of nowhere, all of Hook's men and three dozen Heartless poured out of the bowels of the ship. Only a couple of the Lost Boys screamed. One of them was screaming insults however.

"Not the kids," Riku muttered, slashing away at the closest four Heartless.

xx

"Well, time to really get this party started," Namine muttered, using a rope to stabilize her as she leaned her way around the mast to get a better look. "Tink, you go see if you can find something down in the ship. Or try and get the boys free, something. Let Riku and I take care of the Heartless."

The pixie gave a short nod and flew off.

Namine closed her eyes and shattered a few more Heartless.

Namine slipped off the post she was standing on. Not only that, but she fell hard and fast. She gripped onto the rope tighter. Why wasn't she flying anymore?

Oh. Darkness. Shattering dark memories.

_Not _conducive to flying.

A small scream escaped her lips.

xx

"Namine!" Riku shouted.

"Don't worry… about me…" Namine grunted, trying to pull herself back up onto the post. "You deal with Hook!"

Her command was further emphasized by Hook striking a blow.

"Oi! That was my face!" Riku said, putting his hand to his left cheek where Hook's sword had made a little nick. The bandages wrapped around his hand soaked up the blood rather quickly.

_Well, that's convenient… _he thought.

Hook laughed and struck again. Riku parried this one.

The Heartless had started to surround the masts. They were going for the hearts of the Lost Boys and Namine.

"Keep the boys alive!" Hook shouted to his men. "The girl can be sacrificed to the Heartless!"

Riku's scream of rage prevented Hook from giving any further directions and Hook only _just _blocked the angry blow. Riku still got Hook in the face with a shot of Firaga though.

xx

Hook's men started fending off the Heartless around the Lost Boys. Most of the Heartless decided that it was more beneficial to wait for Namine to fall.

Namine made the mistake of looking down. Everything around the mast beneath her was like a shimmering pool of darkness. She bit her lip and tried once again to pull herself up. It failed again. The rope had loosened just enough to keep her out of reach of the post. And her feet kept sliding against the mast as she struggled. To top it all off, her hands were growing sweaty and were therefore slipping.

"Well, really only one way to go then," she muttered.

She looked down and memorized the positions of as many Heartless as she could. She closed her eyes, focused on shattering the Heartless, and let go.

Her fall was rather silent. The sound of squelching Heartless as they disappeared was completely drowned out by Riku's shouts and the clang of his and Hook's blades.

Namine reached into her bag to pull out something, _anything _to attack the Heartless close-range with. She wasn't sure how many more shatterings she had in her before she collapsed, and she didn't want to find that out today. Her shoes weren't going to do her any good in this situation. She suddenly agreed with Riku about the stilettos. Her fingers grasped a pencil. It would have to do. She supposed if she had to, she could pull out her sketchbook and whack them with that if she had to.

She wrenched her body around in midair and somehow managed to land on her feet. She blindly stabbed the nearest Heartless.

"Darn, that was my silver pencil! Stupid Heartless!"

"I'll buy you another one!" Riku shouted. "Glad to see you're okay!"

"Yeah," Namine said, laughing in relief. "I'm fine."

Riku nodded and went back to attacking Hook. Hook was looking like he was getting the worse end of this deal. Riku was liking his Firaga.

"Take it back," he said.

"Take what back?" Hook asked, flustered. He wasn't thinking very clearly.

"What you said about Namine!"

"She's…"

"If you want to live, don't finish that," Riku growled.

Hook was smart and didn't finish his statement.

xx

"So…much…darkness…" Namine gasped, now completely surrounded by Heartless.

"Riku!" she screamed. The Neoshadows inched closer, grabbing on. She tried to pull free, but she couldn't. They scratched against her arms and feet. She couldn't get to her sketchbook, or a shoe or anything to bat them away. They just kept coming. More kept appearing. The darkness swelled, no longer in the form of individual Heartless anymore.

"Riku!" she repeated, burying her face in her hands. A small pulse of light glowed around her, but it wasn't enough to destroy any of the Heartless, only keep some at bay.

Riku's head whipped around to see where Namine was. He swore. He aimed another Firaga at Hook. However, this one was a Dark Firaga. Riku was too scared for Namine to even care. He froze Hook to the side of the ship with a well-aimed Blizzaga.

"Can you clear me a path?" he asked.

She shook her head, tears streaming down her cheeks.

Riku used some of Axel's favorite words, some of which the pyro had stolen from the Mad Madam Mim.

"There's too much…" she whimpered.

Her voice was barely over a whisper.

Riku looked at the hundreds of Heartless between him and Namine and did some very quick calculations.

Tink appeared beside his face, jangling something angrily.

"How can I think happy thoughts when this is happening?" he yelled, guessing at what she was trying to tell him.

Tink frowned.

Riku scrunched up his face and tried to think of something happy, fast. He remembered the look on Namine's face maybe half an hour before as they had been flying. He felt his feet lift up off the ground. He crouched forward and launched himself through the Heartless, using some more Dark Firaga for a bit of momentum. He didn't care about his darkness levels at the moment, they would get a whole lot worse if something happened to Namine, he decided.

Every single one of the Heartless he touched died instantly.

He stopped short in front of Namine, swatting away even more Heartless. They were drawn by the strength of her Heart, not to mention his Keyblade.

"Back off!" he shouted.

They almost seemed to listen a little.

"Riku, don't use your darkness," Namine whispered.

"I'll use it if the flip side is losing you," he said, trying to get his arms underneath her.

"What are you doing?" she asked, her voice strained.

"Trying to get you out of here!"

"There's too much darkness…"

"Then we are going to have to take care of that," he muttered, throwing his arms around her. "Help me a little, okay?"

She buried her face in his chest.

All sorts of colors surrounded them and exploded outwards, destroying every single Heartless on the ship. The ropes binding the Lost Boys disintegrated. The Blizzaga surrounding Hook melted, but the attack left him and all of his men stunned. Everyone fell silent. No more Heartless appeared. The only sound was the waves lapping up against the sides of the ship.

Riku pulled away from Namine just enough to look her in the face. He wiped the tears away from her eyes. She let out a chocked sob and a strangled cry.

"Shh," he comforted. "It's okay now. What happened?"

"I can't shatter them and fly at the same time, there's too much darkness," she said, her voice quiet and strained. "And then… there was just… too much… So many dark memories. A couple dozen I can handle, but there were easily a hundred of them…"

Riku pulled her close to him and rocked her back and forth, cradling her in his arms.

"Shh," he repeated. "They're all gone now. We got rid of them."

"We?"

"I couldn't have done that move by myself," he said.

She sniffled. "How's your darkness?"

"I think it's in check. You're okay, that's all that matters."

"What do we do now?"

"Oh, they've just made it very easy now," he said, a grim smile growing on his face. "Hook's insulted you twice now and the Heartless made you cry. Things are going to go _very _smoothly now from this point on."

"How does that…?" Namine began.

But Riku was already resting her against the mast of the ship and standing up. He glared at Hook and all of Hook's men.

"Do you hear that?" he asked, raising his voice. "You've just made this a very easy decision. I don't care about anything else. That was too far. Way too much darkness. Namine's a strong girl, and if she's overpowered, well, then that's where I come in."

He re-summoned his blade, because it was easier than bending down and picking it up off the ground where it lay next to Namine. He pointed it at Hook.

"You better start talking, or I'm going to start attacking."

"Not in front of the boys," Namine whispered hoarsely.

He looked back at her, a wry grin on his face. "Fine, I'll go easy on him." He turned back to Hook. "Take back what you said about Namine. Take back even what you didn't even say. And then give me three good reasons not to kill you and all of your men right here."


	17. To Rescue Namine

**Author's Note: **Happy New Year, everyone! (Though, it's still a few hours out where I am...) But, Happy New Year anyway! Part Three of Namiku in Neverland! Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"I don't see <em>you <em>doing sentry duty!"

xx

Hook's men all started blabbing at once. None of it was helpful. Riku told them to shut up. He looked back at Hook. Hook remained pointedly silent.

"At least take back what you said about Namine," Riku said.

"Is it that important to you?" Hook sneered.

"Riku," Namine said quietly. "It's not that important…"

"Oh, it's very important," Riku said, with a very empty laugh. "No one says that my girlfriend can be sacrificed to the Heartless and get away from it."

It became very obvious to Namine that Riku wasn't going to let this go.

"Fine," Hook snapped. "I take that back."

"You want to take the other one back?" Riku asked.

"I didn't even say anything!" Hook said.

"No, but you started to," Riku said. "Take it back."

Namine gasped behind him.

Riku cast a glance her direction. "What?" he asked.

"I know what he was going to…" Namine said, her voice possibly even more quiet than it had been before.

"What?" Riku asked slowly.

"If I tell you, you will kill him," Namine said. "And I don't want that on our consciences."

Riku growled. Namine cursed herself internally for her curiosity.

Then the weight of the one word that had floated to the top of Hook's mind crashed down on her. She gasped again, covering up yet another chocked sob.

Worthless.

"I'll show _you _worthless," she whispered, picking herself up.

She dug both of her shoes out of her bag and chucked them at Hook. One hit him on the nose, the other one knocked his hat off into the sea behind. The shoe clattered onto the deck.

"The Captain's hat!" Smee shouted.

Two of the men dove in to get it.

Namine glared at Hook.

"Take it back!" she shouted.

"How could you even know?" Hook sneered.

"Take it back!" she screamed.

"I won't take back something I haven't said!" Hook replied hotly.

About six more Heartless appeared around him. Namine gave a cry of frustration and they disappeared. Hook gasped.

"It's you!" he said. "You have a mysterious power over _my _Heartless! You witch!"

Riku didn't even get a chance to attack Hook. Hook collapsed to the deck of the ship, clutching his head in pain. All of his men, Smee included, looked on Namine with horror.

Riku slowly walked over to the captain and looked down on him. He turned back to Namine.

"Is he…?"

She shook her head. "If I had shattered him, you would know. He merely has an incapacitating headache."

Riku blinked. "What did he say?" he repeated.

"I'll tell you when you're not in killing range of him."

Riku tried to argue that one, but found that he couldn't.

It came to his attention that there was a high likelihood of him or Namine killing just about any one of Hook's men on this ship at that particular moment. It was a disturbing feeling. While he was over here, he decided to pick up Namine's shoes. He pocketed them to get them out of the way.

"Now," Namine said, looking at the men. "Do any of you know where Peter is?"

All of them shook their heads.

"Do you know?" Namine asked again, looking at the Lost Boys.

The four of them shook their heads as well, unsure of how to address this new girl with so many powers.

"Right, well, cool," she said, frowning. "Oh, Riku, you're bleeding."

Riku looked himself over, he had a lot of scratches on his arms, but he hadn't even noticed them until that very moment.

"So are you," he replied.

She looked at her arms and legs. The scratches from the Heartless were unmistakable. At least those scratches didn't carry traces of darkness, even with the Heartless being just that: darkness.

"Cure," she said, holding her hand in the air.

The magic did little to help. Namine swayed and gripped onto the side of the ship for support. Riku rushed over to stabilize her.

"Curaga," he said, rather loudly.

The spell encompassed them both. Their wounds healed immediately. So did the few wounds the Lost Boys had incurred, since they were standing close enough to the couple.

Riku backed away from Namine slowly, but she still swayed. He rushed to stabilize her again.

"You've used too much of your powers," he said. "And I don't carry Elixirs."

Namine looked up at him. With a rather dazed look on her face she said, "Why ever not?"

"Because my magic refills itself after a while, so does Sora's."

"How does that happen?" she still sounded rather dazed.

"It just does!" Riku argued, unsure of what to do. Namine wasn't even holding her own weight anymore. She was being supported solely by Riku and the ship behind her. "When you get powerful enough, it just does…"

He looked around, trying to see if any of the people around would offer any help. Hook's men were slowly slinking away. Smee had knelt down beside Hook to see if he was all right. Hook hadn't moved at all. The Lost Boys were all shifting uncomfortably, unsure of how to react to this situation they now found themselves in.

Riku helped Namine sit down. Her head lolled to the side and the very blank look she was giving was starting to disturb him. He kicked himself for not coming prepared. He had Potions of all types, but nothing to boost magic, or power, or whatever it was that Namine used. There was no telling if an ether or an Elixir would even help. It had been a long time since anyone he'd fought with had strained their magic abilities. As of late, both he and Sora's magic recharged and he'd never seen Axel have any problems.

Roxas and Xion took care of themselves. Kairi had either never reached her brink, or she didn't have one, which was entirely possible given her Princess of Heart status.

Namine had just reached her brink.

And he needed to do something about it.

Now.

But a small part inside of him felt responsible for the Lost Boys standing behind him. He knew Namine would berate him for leaving them, even if she didn't remember this part of their adventure. He didn't like this predicament.

"Hey, sorry I'm late, guys," came a very familiar voice.

Riku spun around to see Peter floating above them. The only people still on deck besides him and Namine were the Lost Boys. Smee had apparently dragged Hook below deck.

"Gee, Peter, what happened?" one of the Lost Boys asked.

"I got distracted by one of these guys!" Peter exclaimed holding up, of all things, a Dancer. It struggled in Peter's grasp, but didn't do any damage. "I can't seem to get rid of it, so I thought I'd leave it for the old Codfish as a present."

Riku decided very quickly that the Dancer was a potential threat. He pointed his Keyblade at it and shot it with a plain old Firaga. The Dancer disappeared right out of Peter's hand.

"Hey!" Peter exclaimed. "How'd you do that?"

"Magic, learn some," Riku replied gruffly. "You don't happen to have an ether, do you?"

Peter shook his head.

Riku groaned. He started reaching for the star shard in his pocket, seeing no more obligation to stay here anymore now that Peter had shown up. However he realized one more thing that he should probably ask about. When there was one Nobody…

"Were there any more of those?" Riku asked.

Peter shook his head.

"Odd," Riku muttered. But he would take it. "Right, well if you do see anymore, get them with magic, it'll probably work most effectively on them. They're stubborn."

"But we don't know any magic!" one of the Lost Boys wailed.

"Like I said," Riku said, trying to keep his voice even. "Learn some. Now if you don't mind, I'm taking Namine to a place where she can…"

He wasn't even sure how to finish that sentence… Rest? Get better? Get healed? Something! _Any_thing besides this dazed expression she was giving him and the world around her.

He growled and pulled the star shard out of his pocket. He maneuvered so that Namine at least would have a soft landing.

"Good luck," Peter said.

Riku nodded, but didn't say anything.

"He was going to shoot us out of the cannon, Peter!" one of the Lost Boys exclaimed.

"Not that it would do any good!" another one added.

Riku didn't hear anymore, the star shard carried both him and Namine away. They landed in the middle of the entrance hall of Castle Oblivion. Riku had thought about going to Hollow Bastion to see Aerith or Rinoa, but he figured Namine had enough data in her that perhaps a Vexen Replica would be best.

Speaking of Vexen Replicas, there was one of them.

"Riku, Miss Namine, what brings you…"

He didn't even finish his sentence. He saw Namine's now limp body and promptly freaked out.

"I'll go get 42," he said and formed a dark corridor. He disappeared.

"Namine," Riku said. Her eyes were closed. "Namine!" he repeated.

He leaned forward and listened to her chest. Her heart was beating and she was breathing. She appeared to have just gone unconscious.

42 appeared alongside the first Vexen Replica that had greeted them (27).

"What has happened here?" 42 asked.

"She…" Riku began.

"Never mind," 42 said, interrupting him. "I know exactly what happened here. She overused her powers, didn't she?"

"How did you know?" Riku asked.

"Lucky guess. But I'm right, aren't I?"

Riku wasn't sure whether to be frustrated or relieved that 42 didn't seem to be too worried. He couldn't be sure if this was because Namine was going to be okay, or 42 just didn't have any feelings because he was fashioned after a Nobody. It was a very annoying feeling.

He nodded.

"What all did she do?"

"Well, she was shattering Heartless, and then she was sort of fending them off by hand, then she and I did a combo, then she shattered some more Heartless and gave Hook a headache… Ironically, it was the Cure that…"

Riku stopped talking. 42 didn't appear to have wanted the information for Namine's recovery at all. He was taking notes like he was conducting research.

Riku growled. "How do I… make her better?"

"Simple, she's human enough for an ether or an Elixir to work."

Riku growled. Of course. He _could _have gone to Aerith or Rinoa.

"I don't suppose you happen to have one of those, do you?" he asked through clenched teeth.

42 shook his head, but 27 pulled a small blue bottle out of his cloak pocket. 42 looked at him with an oddly confused expression on his face.

"What?" 27 asked. "They work on Replicas too! And they're excellent for staying awake for that extra couple of days. I don't see _you _doing sentry duty!"

Riku rolled his eyes and took the bottle from 27's hand.

"Come on, Namine, wake up and drink this," he said quietly.

"She might need to eat too," 27 offered. "That might help. Some nice soup…"

Namine had not budged. Frowning, Riku decided that he didn't want her waking up here anyway. He activated the star shard again, this time arriving in Aerith's front room. He hoped both the Vexen Replicas were startled by his sudden exit.

"Another' star shard," Cid said. "Goodness, how many do yeh guys have between all ya'll? Oh…"

"Yeah, oh," Riku said.

"Does she need a Cure or a soup?" Cid asked, sitting up straighter on the couch.

"Soup," Riku replied.

Cid heaved himself up. "I'll go make it. Hand me tha' Elixir, it'll do her more good in teh soup than plain. Especially since she's pass'd ou'."

Riku grimaced, but handed the Elixir over.

"Aerith!" Cid shouted up the stairs on his way to the kitchen. "We've got more comp'ny!"


	18. Who's looking out for me?

**Author's Note: **A quick update? What? ! Well... given the fact that I'm going to have company here in the next couple of days, then I'm going to a local anime convention, I figured I should at LEAST get up the last Namiku in Neverland (even though they're no longer in Neverland anymore) chapter before that all goes down. Because, after this, I honestly don't know when I'll have time to get anything written/edited/betaed/posted. We'll see what happens. I've got stuff I've gotta take care of before the whole internship in Florida thing too. So... sorry in advance if I drop off the face of the planet.

On that lovely note... enjoy the chapter! I'm sure you've all been dying to know what happens to Namine.

* * *

><p>"And try to find one close to your hair color!"<p>

xx

It took Aerith all of ten seconds to pad down the stairs. Her boots barely made a sound. She took one look at Riku and Namine and frowned.

"She overexerted herself," Riku said lamely.

"I'll go get Rinoa," Aerith said, disappearing back upstairs.

Namine stirred, whimpering slightly.

"Hey, hey, it's okay," he said. "I'm here."

"We were in Castle Oblivion," she said quietly, not even opening her eyes.

"Yes, for a brief moment. I figured you wouldn't want to wake up there."

Her eyes flew open. "Take me back."

"What? No! You're going to stay here and get soup; it'll make you feel better!"

"I want to go back. I want to fix it so I don't get affected by the darkness like that. There has to be some way to desensitize myself to that. I don't want to be incapacitated…"

Riku frowned.

"What?" she asked.

"You can't just do that."

"Well sure I can!"

"No," he repeated, shaking his head. "Because then what makes you any different from people like Saix or Xehanort, who use their powers without thinking of the consequences."

"Oh," Namine said quietly.

"Besides," Riku argued. "That's cheating if you just go in and change your programming anytime you feel like it because you don't like something about yourself. The rest of us have to work on it the hard way."

Namine coughed.

"Whoa, sorry, hey! Are you okay?"

She nodded and tried to sit up. Riku frowned, but helped her, getting her situated up against one of the couches. She rubbed her head.

"What happened?" she asked. "I tried to Cure…"

"You used too much of your powers," came Rinoa's soft voice. "Or rather, too much too quickly. Anyone's magic will return with some help, or a good night's rest, or just a little time if you're strong enough. But you seem to have spent all of your magical energy much too quickly."

"Is what I even do magic?" Namine asked.

Rinoa shrugged. "What is it that you do?"

"I have power over memories," Namine replied, her voice barely over a whisper.

"Well, it's _something_," Rinoa replied, not even blanching at what Namine could do. "And it's not hacking and slashing."

"Are we arguing about the best ways to fight again?" came a voice from the back of the house.

"No, Zack," Aerith called back. "We're not."

If Zack responded, they didn't hear it.

Rinoa looked Namine over. "You just need some rest and Cid's soup. You'll be fine."

"Even with the data…"

"Remember?" Riku said. "42 said you'd be fine."

"Oh, I missed that part."

Rinoa knelt down beside the two of them.

"May I?" she asked Riku, gesturing to Namine.

Riku backed away, feeling entirely inadequate.

"Just relax," Rinoa said, looking Namine in the eye. "It won't hurt at all."

Namine nodded slowly.

Rinoa put her hands on Namine's shoulders and leaned in so that their foreheads were touching. Rinoa closed her eyes, and after a moment, Namine did too.

After a moment, Rinoa pulled away.

"That's quite the combo you pulled," she said, leaning back on her heels. "Do you have a name for it?"

Both Namine and Riku shook their heads.

"It looks a bit like a decompression of sorts; perhaps that's what you should call it. Anyway, it really is no wonder you're feeling like this. You did a lot. And, as simple as a Cure may be, it takes a lot of magic to pull one off successfully."

"What did you do?" Riku asked.

"Oh, I replayed your lives from the past hour or so. Don't worry, I skipped over the more private parts. It's a trick Squall's sister taught me."

Namine clutched her forehead.

"What is it?" Riku asked.

"Everything's so empty-looking," she said quietly. "I can't see anything."

"Have you had anything to replenish your magic?" Aerith asked.

Namine shook her head.

"Cid, how's that soup coming?" she called.

"It takes awhile teh be good!" he shouted back.

Aerith muttered something and waved her hand over Namine. Blue dust surrounded the blonde and instinctively, she breathed in deeply.

"There," she said. "Much better."

"No sense leaving you completely dry," Aerith muttered. "It's dangerous on multiple levels. Anyway, you two rest up here until the soup's ready."

Leon came down the stairs. "We lost two and gained two," he said, looking at Riku and Namine.

"Roxas and Xion?" Namine asked.

Leon nodded, not even wondering how Namine knew that.

Riku shifted uncomfortably. Namine noticed this and patted the spot on the floor next to her. She smiled weakly.

"I'm not going to break," she told him. "I'm feeling better already."

He moved so that he was sitting next to her. He put his arm around her and she leaned on his shoulder. Rinoa nodded in satisfaction and picked herself up. Aerith smiled and got up to leave them alone as well.

"Thank you," she said.

"For what?" he asked.

"For rescuing me from the Heartless, for getting me out of Neverland. Oh! Did we ever figure out what happened to Peter?"

"Yeah, he showed up right after you tried to Cure us. He'd been having problems with a Dancer. Just one though! Weird, huh?"

She nodded. Then, after a moment, she said: "I'm sorry."

He frowned. "Sorry for what?"

"For not being strong enough."

"Oh let it go," Riku said. "Don't apologize to me for that. We're fine. Well, you've been better, but we're fine. Would you like to talk about it?"

"Well, for starters, I can't fly when I'm shattering Heartless."

Riku winced, he remembered her saying something about that earlier.

"And, well, they just kept multiplying. The darkness got to be…"

"Too much," Riku realized.

He turned to hug her, and he ended up holding her very closely to him for a rather long time. Her breathing slowed and her racing heart quieted. He felt bad for asking her to try and talk about it; it hadn't seemed to do any good.

"It's okay to ask me for help," he said.

"But I didn't want you to think that I'm not capable of taking care of myself."

"I don't think that," Riku replied. "And I'm not going to think that. I rather like fighting alongside you. But, seriously, just ask for help next time. If I have to, I can be strong enough for the both of us."

She did an odd combination of laughing and crying. Riku held her closer. He took a stab on what she was thinking about and said:

"It's okay, they're all gone now. I killed them. And you took care of Hook."

She sniffled.

"What did he call you, anyway?"

"Worthless," she whispered.

He growled.

"Don't," Namine said. "He's already wishing he hadn't. And he probably will never be able to look me in the eye again."

"We could have easily killed him," Riku muttered.

"I know," Namine said. "Though I've learned something very important."

"Yeah?"

"It's significantly harder to shatter real memories than it is to shatter false ones. What I did to Hook, and what I did to Xehanort that one time was more like scrambling than shattering."

"Huh. What about Heartless and Nobodies?"

"Those are shatterings. They've got like, fragments of memories, which are more unstable than fake ones."

"Shatterings?"

"Sure, that's what I'm calling them."

It sounded rather brutal to Riku, but he didn't want to mention that out loud.

"Soup's up!" Cid declared, bringing two bowls for Riku and Namine. "Anyone who wants some come get it!"

A few others came to grab a bowl. Yuffie was the first in line. Zack and Cloud came right after her. Riku noticed that Zack had a lovely fresh gash on his cheek.

"Zack!" Aerith cried exasperatedly. "I told you not to mess with it!"

Zack shrugged. "The soup'll take care of it."

She looked like she wanted to argue with him, but didn't. Riku laughed a little at the situation. He looked back over at Namine and noticed that her soup was already gone. He handed her his bowl, even though he'd only gotten maybe two bites.

"Are you sure?" she asked.

"I'm doing quite fine," Riku said. "You could use a little extra."

Namine took his bowl and downed it pretty quickly too. She had regained some color in her cheeks and her eyes looked brighter. She set down the bowl and pulled out her sketchbook and pencils.

"Nuts," she muttered. "I won't be able to color this."

She had barely begun to sketch.

"Why not?" Riku asked.

"My silver pencil disappeared into a Heartless."

It didn't take Riku long to realize that he was one of the two people in the picture. She was the other one, and she was flying.

"Why couldn't it have been the green one?" she muttered, mostly to herself.

Riku patted her shoulder and stood up. She watched him walk over to where Aerith and Zack were sitting for a moment, then she returned to her drawing.

"Hey, do you know a place where I can buy some pencils?" Riku asked. "Namine's lost her silver one."

"There's a place just down the street," Aerith replied. "The sign above the door is a palette of paint. The shopkeeper is a really nice little lady."

Riku nodded. "Thank you, I'll be right back."

Aerith looked around him to see Namine. Namine was still leaning back against the couch, and was completely absorbed in the picture she was drawing.

"I'll keep an eye on her," she said, smiling. "And I'll dig out some ethers for her to carry around; since I figure that is one thing that you don't keep on you."

Riku shrugged. "Sora and I don't really have a need for them anymore."

"Well, you look out for your party," Aerith said.

Zack snorted into his soup.

"If you are thinking about that time with the rain and the giant Heartless, I'm not laughing with you," Aerith chided.

It didn't stop Zack from laughing.

Riku decided he didn't want to know. He walked back over to Namine and knelt down next to her, pulling her shoes out of his pocket.

"Just in case you need these while I'm gone," he said, setting them down beside her.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

He laughed; she hadn't been paying attention at all.

"I'm going to go buy you a new set of pencils," he said.

"I only need a silver one," she said. "Oh, and maybe another blue…"

He smiled. "I'll see what I can do."

"I have munny," she said, digging in her bag.

"It's on me this time."

"You already bought me a new sketchbook though," she argued.

He shrugged. "Don't worry about it. I've got more munny than you at the moment. You just sit here and… draw."

"You were going to tell me to rest, weren't you?" she asked, a wry smile on her face.

He shook his head, but they both knew he was lying.

She shooed him away with her hand. "Just go. And try and find one close to your hair color!"

Riku laughed and made his way out the front door. When he had left, Aerith turned to Namine and asked:

"Should I give you the ethers, or him?"

"I can carry them," Namine said. "I'm the one who needs them anyway."

Aerith smiled knowingly. "I'll go get a dozen or so."


	19. The Rustling Forest

**Author's Note: **I'm baaack! (More or less, anyway). Taiyou was great, now for some business in Tucson before heading off to Florida. Fun times! Anywho, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"New tactic, don't stand right next to each other."<p>

xx

_Enchanted Dominion_

"Found you!"

She spun around, her guns instantly trained at vital organs. She hid her frown. She had been frowning because he had snuck up on her—and she had let him.

"Whoa, now wait a second!" he said, lowering his hood. "Sheesh, it's just me."

The flaming red hair was unmistakable. She holstered her guns.

"Hello, Axel," she said.

"Yo!" he responded with a mock-salute.

"You're wearing one of those cloaks," she said, frowning.

He looked down. "_Really_? Does it scream 'Organization' that bad? The Organization doesn't even exist anymore! I just wear the cloak for the functionality when I'm out and about, and the slight epic-ness. Plus, it's comfortable."

She found herself wondering if there was any correlation between the cloak that Axel was currently wearing, and the cloak that Marluxia had been wearing mere days before.

"Where'd you get it?" she asked, deciding to at least make conversation. Maybe she'd learn something.

"It's a long story. Where'd you get yours?"

She remembered that she still had her cloak on from the last world she'd been at. She'd taken care of the giant Heartless, ignored the celebratory ceremony, and had left. She'd come straight here because there was a high level of darkness here and she was trying to figure out why.

"It's a long story," she replied.

He smiled and she realized that he had been playing her. He hadn't particularly wanted to know where she had gotten her cloak from. He was just proving a point.

She wasn't sure how she felt about that.

"How did you know where to find me?" she asked, instead. If he had followed her, then she needed to know how he'd managed it so she could avoid being tracked in the future.

"To be completely honest, I didn't," he replied, putting his hands on his hips. "I have this dartboard, see? I put the names of every world I could think of on it and shot darts blindly until I hit a world. This happened to be the first one I hit."

The story was so absurd, she had to wonder if he had just made it up. But at the same time, it was just _that _absurd that it might actually be true.

"Are you expecting me to believe that?"

"I'm not expecting you to do anything, to be completely honest," he said. "I mean, it'd be nice if you stood there and watched me gloat because I was able to find you. However, that's a rather mean move on my part"

"Are you actually going to gloat, then?"

"Only internally," he replied, grinning wryly. "However, I _did _find you."

He frowned, looking at something behind her. She whirled around to see a Large Body Heartless. Her gun was already aimed at it, but she knew she'd have to get around to the back of it due to the shield it had up.

A chakram whizzed past her. It boomeranged around the Large Body and clunked it on the back of the head. It disappeared in a puff of black smoke. The chakram came right back to Axel and he caught it lazily.

Her nose twitched. She was intrigued.

She sighed. "Not that I'm saying that I _need _your help," she said. "But since you've already insisted on giving it to me, would you like to come along with me while I try and see what's causing the increase in darkness in this world?"

"Sure," he replied, sounding only half as interested as she had expected him to. "I can tell you now it's _not _because of Maleficent."

Maleficent. She racked her brain. Evil witch, caused a lot of Heartless problems. She hailed from this world long ago.

"How do you know?"

He coughed. "Killed her myself."

She raised her eyebrows. Interesting.

"So do you have any idea on where you're starting in this world? Or are you just poking around until you find what you're looking for?" he asked.

"Well, I know it's nearby," she said.

She didn't want to tell him _how _she knew that. However, her glider always brought her _relatively _close to the enemies.

"That's not much to go off of," he said.

"Do you have any better ideas?"

Apparently, he did. He put his hand out in front of him and made a gesture as if he was summoning something. Turns out he was, for two white slithery creatures came to him. They looked like Nobodies if she wasn't mistaken. In fact, she could be almost certain that they _were _Nobodies. She'd killed things exactly like these before.

"Go find the source of the darkness," he told them. "And report back to me _before _you decide to commit suicide by going after any hearts they may or may not contain."

The two Nobodies disappeared into corridors of darkness.

"They'll be back," he said, shrugging. "In the meantime, we can keep meandering about. It wouldn't be the only time I found what I was looking for before they did. Assassins are smarter than your average Dusk, but they're still pretty brainless at times."

"They're Nobodies," she said, frowning.

"Yeah."

"How do you have control over _them_?"

He eyed her curiously.

"You've sworn to kill darkness, haven't you?"

She frowned. "Not darkness, per say. I'm just around to keep the balance."

She wasn't sure why she'd just told him that. However, she liked people to have an accurate description of what her job was when they spent the time trying to figure it out. She could always kill him if he somehow managed to turn the information against her.

"Very Keyblade-wielderish," he muttered.

That's right; he'd dealt with Keyblade wielders. She had mixed feelings about them. There was a time when the people who did her job had worked—well, maybe not together, but certainly alongside—the Keyblade wielders. But not all Keyblade wielders kept to the promise of balance. Xehanort had been a wielder, after all. Plus, after the Keyblade War, wielders had been sparse. She'd spent the first ten years of her career believing that the Keyblade had died out.

"Are you going to tell me how you have control over those Nobodies or not?" she asked, trying to direct the conversation back to her original question.

"I don't think I will," he said.

"Why? Are you afraid I'll kill you or something?"

"No. But I know you'll judge me based on my past. I'd rather let you figure out who I am and what I'm about with_out _knowing my life's story."

She had to give him that. It was a rather honorable decision. She herself probably abided by something similar. Though, she never actually let people figure her out.

She wished she could look him up in the database. But the database hadn't been updated in thirteen years. There was probably no more information on him in it than there was on herself. Though, it might at least give her _some _clue. That would also require going _home_ though.

One of the Assassins reappeared. It relayed something to Axel, though Kuin had absolutely no clue what it was saying. It only bothered her a little. She was still thinking about databases.

Axel sighed exasperatedly. "Can you show me _without _using a corridor? I'd prefer not to have to drag Kuin here through one."

"Corridor?" she asked, frowning.

"Dark one," he amended. "Frankly, _I'd _prefer not to use one."

The Assassin seemed to argue with Axel. Axel kicked it. The Assassin started slithering off in one direction.

"Come on, let's follow it," Axel said, taking off.

Kuin pulled out her guns and started following after them. She wanted to ask him how he knew about dark corridors and why he didn't want to use one. She could think of many reasons why they were bad and she half wondered if he had the same reasons. On that note, if he could summon Nobodies to do his bidding, could he not form a dark corridor himself?

But asking such questions put her in a vulnerable position. If she showed that she was curious enough to ask, then that told him that she was interested in him to some degree. Plus, if he answered them, then he could say that she should answer some of his questions.

And, there was always the pesky part where he could lie. Granted, she was a pretty good liar herself and could probably pick them out. However, he could be a good liar. Or he could only tell her half-truths—which made good lies.

"Why does it not surprise me that we are going into a dark and dreary forest?" Axel asked sarcastically as they came up upon just that—a dark and dreary forest.

"Do you want to go first," she asked. "Or shall I?"

He pondered this. "Well, chivalry says 'ladies first.' However, I'm pretty sure chivalry also says that I should go first because this could be dangerous."

"Oddly, you don't strike me as the chivalrous person."

He laughed. "Do you want to go first?"

"If you go first, you better have something to light the way," she said, reaching in her back for a light.

He snapped his fingers. They lit on fire.

That's right, he was a pyrotechnic.

"Go right on ahead then."

"Cover me," he said with a wry grin, and started in.

She rolled her eyes at him and followed after. She didn't trust the man at all. But, she got a feeling that he knew what he was doing when it came to monsters. He seemed to know quite a bit. And he'd taken down that Large Body with no hesitation whatsoever. He'd also done a clean job of it.

They heard Heartless appearing.

"Can you fight in the dark?" Axel asked.

"Why?"

"Because I can't keep my fingers lit and fight at the same time. Granted, I can use flaming chakrams, but that's not going to be consistent light."

She noticed he said nothing in particular about the possibility of lighting the forest around them on fire. But she was sure that could be a possibility as well.

"Just start killing things," she said. "I'll get a light for the both of us that's consistent."

He already appeared to be killing things from the sounds of it. She reached into her bag and pulled out a little orb.

"Hikari!" she shouted, throwing the orb into the air.

It hovered over them both, casting a pale glow around the area.

All the Heartless were pure blood. There were a lot of Darkballs, and some that she didn't particularly have names for, but they were somewhere in between Novashadows and Dark Followers in size, and just as ugly.

At the advent of the light, many of the Heartless blanched and they tried to reach up and destroy it. This made it an easier job for Axel and Kuin, who could target the Heartless targeting the light.

"Darkness expelling itself," Axel mused.

"What do you mean?"

"All of them are pure blood," he said. "And you said the darkness levels were high as of recent?"

"Relatively, yes."

"Then yeah, this is darkness expelling itself."

"That doesn't answer _why _though."

"I never said it did."

She frowned, wanting to shoot him for that cheek. She settled on killing Darkballs however. They were annoying if you let them live long enough.

"What causes darkness to expel itself?" he asked.

"Do you not know?"

"I'm trying to pick your brain."

She sighed.

"It's exactly what it sounds like," she replied flatly. "There's a build-up of darkness for whatever reason and then, when the reason for the build-up disappears, the darkness explodes. Are you suggesting that perhaps since Maleficent is gone that…?"

"Nah. We killed Maleficent months ago. This is way too long after her death."

"You said that _you _had killed her earlier."

"Well, I was the one that made her choke on her own fire. There was some Keyblade-smashing to the face, too."

"So if this isn't Maleficent being gone, then what is it?"

"Absolutely no clue!"

"You're no help here!"

He laughed.

Something roared behind them. They spun around and found themselves face-to-face with a giant ugly-looking Heartless.

"Well, this certainly isn't helping," Axel pointed out.

Kuin snorted. "Let's see how well you handle bosses!"

He laughed. "Let's see how well you fight with fire."

He extended his arms to either side of him. His chakrams spun about and instantly, the two of them, along with the giant ugly Heartless, were trapped inside a ring of fire.

"Don't get too close to the edges," he warned. "I can't keep it from hurting you. But it'll keep this bad-guy from running."

"You do this with all your enemies?"

"The big ones, yeah."

The Heartless took a swipe at them and they jumped out of the way.

"New tactic, don't stand right next to each other!" she shouted.

"Yeah, well, that's kind of obvious when you think about it."

She decided that she had no clue what to do with him. She could not predict him at all. He would play like he didn't care or didn't know, and then he'd spew out something showing that he did.

It was rather frustrating.

She took out her frustration on the ugly Heartless in the form of well-placed bullets between its eyes.


	20. Turning the Key

**Author's Note: **Sorry for such a delay. First, there was a convention, then there was half a week down in Tucson, most of which was spent without internet other than that on my phone. I didn't get this chapter sent for beta until two nights ago. I SHOULD have had it up last night, but I didn't because of reasons.

For those of you who particularly care, it's 'cause I have the whole 'this chapter of your life is ending, prepare to start a new one' feeling going on. I just said goodbye to my boyfriend for what is probably going to be the last time before I leave for Florida and there's a whole ton of other stuff going on with that situation that I won't dump on all of you. In addition, I'm a little depressed because of the Skyward Sword scene I just watched... for those of you who have played it already, it's the scene where you go back in time the first time and you learn a whole bunch of depressing stuff. Anywho...

Now, onto a chapter that is significantly less depressing! My goal is to have it posted both here and on dA tonight... then tomorrow (when I'm done filing my taxes) I'll put up a burst of three blog posts, one about the chapter, a Q&A blog (so submit your questions), and a random happy blog about things that don't pertain to the last several chapters at all, but rather a side story like substance.

Enough of my rambling...

* * *

><p>"Well, well, well, you <em>can <em>work even when I'm significantly vague..."

xx

Axel decided he quite liked fighting alongside Kuin. She was smart and could hold her own. That wasn't to say that half the other people he knew could do the same. However, some of them had habits of getting distracted, or charging into things, or showing off.

Which, he reminded himself, was a bad thing for him to be doing at this particular moment. He resisted the urge to bring the walls of fire closer for his own benefit. Though he could pass through it with no harm to himself, and Roxas was getting pretty immune too, he knew Kuin wasn't. And, it wouldn't be good if it was his fault that she got injured.

She was certainly helping with the Heartless however. Axel had never seen one this big, not outside of the random images from Sora's memory that had been displayed on the Castle Oblivion computers at times. It was large and beast-like. It wasn't pure black like many pure blooded Heartless; rather, it had streaks of blue and red and purple muscle-like substances. It also had a mouth, with teeth. When it picked its front paws up off the ground, the claws dripped with darkness. Axel knew that with many large Heartless, you went for the hands. But this time it seemed more prudent to just go straight for its face.

At least it was susceptible to fire.

He lit both his chakrams on fire and chucked them at the Heartless' face. One clipped it on the nose before boomeranging back to him. The other one got nabbed by the Heartless' mouth.

"Well, if we're going to play catch," he muttered. He snapped his fingers, the already flaming chakram combusted completely.

The Heartless yowled in pain, swiping out blindly in rage. Axel teleported out of the way. Kuin, however, was not so lucky. Its paw got her right in the chest, sending her backwards and likely knocking all of the air out of her lungs.

She barely even made a sound. Axel started over to her, to make sure she was still alive.

"Just kill the _shibbin _thing already!" she swore. "I'll heal myself."

Axel had no clue what '_shibbin_' meant exactly, but the implications were quite clear.

Without even a second thought, he sent up three pillars of flame through the Heartless. It howled some more, though it did not move. Perhaps it was too large to move.

Axel backed up until he was almost outside the flames. He then launched himself forward, adding some fire behind him for momentum. He flew right through the Heartless, trying to do as much damage as he possibly could in that one attack. He repeated that attack twice more before hanging out on the sidelines, catching his breath.

Kuin had healed herself by use of something. Axel hadn't heard her Cure so he assumed she had potions or elixirs or something. Regardless of what she had used, there was no longer a scratch on her.

"Don't move," she told him.

He frowned, unsure of what was going on, but stood still. She ran at him. She leapt at the last minute, used his shoulder as a stepping point and threw herself into the air. She somersaulted and aimed her guns at the Heartless' head. She let down a barrage of bullets, which spiraled down and all hit their mark. Kuin landed next to Axel.

"I was going to use a tree," she said, shrugging. "But you were closer."

"Gee, thanks," he replied, frowning.

The Heartless looked stunned. Axel raised a hand and sent a wall of fire directly at it. The Heartless barely had time to scream in pain before it disappeared.

"I have decided that this is the opposite of darkness expelling itself," Axel said, looking at what was behind where the Heartless had been standing.

They were staring at a rock face, covered with vines and thorns. Behind the plants, however, was a hole.

But it wasn't just any hole. It was a Keyhole.

"Congratulations, Axel," Axel muttered. "You've just found the world's Keyhole and you are lacking a Keyblade wielder to come seal it."

"How do you know it hasn't already been sealed?" Kuin asked.

"Yen Sid said this was one of the ones on the list that hadn't been sealed. Some friends of mine were gonna come get them. They just haven't gotten here yet."

Kuin frowned. "But what if they already…?"

He shook his head. "If that were sealed, we would _not _have run into all those Heartless. Nuts, now I've gotta go back and tell _one _of them to get their behind over here and seal it. And I'll have to send an Assassin so they know where it is."

He cast a glance sideways at the Assassins, who were sniffing the ground, trying to find dropped hearts.

"Good luck with that," he told them. "I need to teach… oh! New tactic!"

He whistled. The Assassins slithered over.

"Go get Roxas or Xion. Bring them here. They'll know what to do."

The Assassins disappeared.

"Can your friends understand them?" Kuin found herself asking.

"Between the two of them, they'll figure it out."

Kuin walked over and inspected the Keyhole. It was unmarred, the Heartless hadn't found a way in just yet.

She realized that she had just come here and prevented the world from crumbling into darkness. The universe must be expecting a lot from her.

"_D'fhonn ard, Cruinne_," she muttered.

"Pardon?" Axel asked.

"It's nothing," she muttered.

"You're a mysterious one."

"You have no room to talk," she replied.

He shrugged and looked at the Keyhole as well.

"I'm half tempted to stay here until someone with a Key shows up," he mused. "I wouldn't want this world to disappear because I was lazy and left before the job was done."

There was really no question about it for her. She was going to stay until whatever Keyblade wielder showed up and locked the Keyhole. She wasn't sure what she would have done without Axel's help. Well, she would have figured something out. But she didn't really want to admit that.

Perhaps the universe had something more along the lines of 'destiny' on its mind. She shifted uncomfortably on her feet, unsure about the changes in the tides of this war she was fighting.

"If you want to go though, you can," Axel said, misinterpreting her actions.

"You'll stay?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Then I think I'll move on," she said. She didn't particularly want to run into any Keyblades at the moment. She had too many mixed feelings about them. Plus, if they knew Axel, then she'd have to explain herself. It sounded like one big headache to her.

Axel didn't seem surprised by this. However, he grabbed her hand. She flinched, but didn't pull it away.

"Why do you move around so much?" he asked her.

"It's my job," she replied simply, reaching up to plant a light kiss on his cheek.

"I will find you again," he said, gripping her hand tighter.

"With your magic dart board?"

"If I have to. You could tell me where you're going."

"I go where my glider takes me," she said. "It takes me where I need to be."

"And where is that?"

She smiled. "I'm not going to tell you."

"Well, I figured I'd ask."

"Thank you," she said, pulling away from him. "For helping me out with that Heartless. It was a nice change in pace."

"No problem."

She pulled out her glider and hopped on. She muttered something and stomped on a particular portion of the glider. A light corridor opened in front of her.

"See you around, Axel," she said.

"See you, 'round," he replied, saluting.

She smiled a little as she disappeared.

Axel scratched his head.

"Well, that was a way to spend the day," he mused.

A dark corridor opened. One Assassin flew out, followed by Xion.

"Where's Roxas?" Axel asked, frowning.

"Sparring with Sora," Xion replied. "Your other Assassin is still trying to get his attention. I don't think it's going to work very well. What's going on?"

Axel jerked his thumb behind him at the Keyhole.

"Oh, hello there," Xion said, peering around Axel. "You just stumbled across this?"

"Well, I killed all the Heartless around it. I sent for you or Roxas because I didn't want to leave it wide open. And you two are the only ones who had a chance at understanding…"

"The Assassins," Xion finished. "Right.

She summoned her Keyblade.

"I've never done this before," she mused.

Axel frowned at her.

"What?" she said, sounding a tad offended. "Since when was a mission in the Organization, 'Go Seal A Keyhole'? Never."

Axel grumbled his agreement.

Xion raised her Keyblade and pointed it at the Keyhole. Nothing happened for a moment.

"Abracadabra?" she said, only half-convinced that it might work.

A beam of light connected her Keyblade to the Keyhole.

"Really?" she asked. "That worked?"

"It's your Keyblade," Axel said, crossing his arms over his chest. "I am not going to offer you any explanation whatsoever."

The light faded.

"I guess it's locked then," Xion said. "Though I don't really think I had to say any magic words. Sora never had to."

"Your Keyblade was just waiting for you to be more sure of yourself," Axel said.

"I thought you weren't going to offer an explanation."

He shrugged.

"Well, that everything?" she asked.

"Yup."

"Cool, I'm going to go back to Destiny Islands. I want to be there when Kairi shows up. Because Sora's not supposed to be using his right hand to fight."

"Let me guess, he's using his right hand?"

"Oh yeah." Xion looked entirely too excited about that fact.

"I'll see if I can make it," Axel said. "There's something I've gotta do first."

"Go for it. See you later!"

"See you."

Xion disappeared back through a dark corridor. Axel pulled out his star shard.

"Take me to where Ven is," Axel said, activating the star shard.

Axel found himself in a yet another woods of sorts.

"Oh, well, isn't this just peachy. Did it even work?"

He sniffed the air. Not that it would do him any good, he wasn't Riku or Zexion. He frowned and was about to activate the star shard again to go to someplace more definitive. He needed to let Ven and the others know that he'd gotten the Keyhole in Enchanted Dominion taken care of. Well, he supposed he didn't _need _to. But, it would be nice and save them a wild goose hunt later at the possible expense of other worlds.

His ears perked up at the sounds of a skirmish. He could make out a couple of battle cries that sounded familiar. One of them was Ven's.

He looked at the star shard in his hands.

"Well, well, well," he said. "You _can _work even when I'm significantly vague. I'm liking this."

Well, rather, he was liking the idea of what he was going to do _after _he told Ven, Aqua and Terra about the Keyhole he'd had sealed.

It might be easier to find Kuin now.


	21. Friendship Between Boys

**Author's Note: **I really must apologize for the delay. I had this betaed a day (two days?) ago. All of my days are just running into each other right now. I've been really busy prepping for Florida (it's real now... next week real) and my boyfriend was so kind as to share his head cold with me. Yup. Anywho, here's the chapter and I'll have a blog up about it tomorrow. My goal is to get at least one more chapter up in the next week before I leave, so I can at least finish this sequence :)

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Hey, isn't that the man who controlled the darkness?"<p>

_xx_

_Dwarf Woodlands_

"I don't know how much you would know about the darkness…" Aqua began, looking at the fair queen.

"What do you wish to know about it?" Snow White replied, a smile on her face.

"Well, what have things been like recently?"

"After Sora restored the worlds after what Maleficent did, things have been pretty quiet. There were only small instances of Heartless—all things we could take care of."

"That's good, then."

"However, recently, the amount of Heartless has increased."

Aqua frowned.

"The dwarves were the first to notice it," Snow White continued. "But it's becoming more and more prevalent. I'm glad that you came, honestly."

Snow White looked like she was going to continue, but both women were interrupted by a small young girl poking her head into the room. She tried to push her hair out of her face, but it didn't work very well.

"Come here, darling," Snow White said, beckoning to her. "Let me braid your hair back."

The little princess nodded and went to her mother, keeping a wary eye on Aqua the entire time. Aqua had to smile in spite of herself. The little girl, Ophelia, was just so adorable. Not that the prince hadn't been; but the princess was just doubly so.

"So, where did your friends go?" Snow White asked. "They didn't stay for very long."

"They went out to go find the Keyhole," Aqua replied.

Snow White frowned. "Why do they need to find the world's Keyhole?"

"Because, currently, it is not sealed," Aqua explained.

Snow White gasped. "Is that why there has been so many Heartless?" she asked.

Aqua nodded.

"Oh dear," Snow White said. "That's not good."

"Terra and Ven are going to take care of it," Aqua assured her.

Snow White nodded. "That's good."

She finished braiding Ophelia's hair. She patted the girl's back and sent her on her way, telling her not to get into too much trouble.

"Will you need to go assist them?" Snow White asked.

"No," Aqua replied, shaking her head. "I told them I would stay here and protect you just in case. The Heartless can get very unpredictable when foiled."

"Well, I don't think that will be necessary," Snow White chided. "We never have any Heartless in the castle."

"Don't speak too soon," Aqua muttered.

"Well, would you like to help me make some pie in the meantime?"

Aqua frowned. "But you're the queen. Can't you have other people make pies for you?"

"Nonsense!" Snow White replied, giggling. "I enjoy making pie. I make all kinds of pie. Every kind except apple; I don't like apple."

Aqua kind of had an idea why.

"Would you like to help me?" Snow White repeated.

Deciding that making pie would at least pass the time while Terra and Ven found the Keyhole, Aqua figured it was as good an idea as any. If trouble started, she'd at least be nearby.

xx

Terra and Ven made their way to the Woodlands. Their progress was a bit slow, given the fact that the Crown Prince had insisted on coming with them. After his father had agreed that it was okay, Terra and Ven were charged with the act of protecting the boy on their excursion. Terra was beginning to wonder just how much of a task this was going to be. Mostly because, as soon as Heartless showed up, they might have some issues. The boy, Rupert only had a small dagger and he had yet to actually use it on an enemy.

Ven, however, was walking alongside Rupert, pretending to hack up grass with his Keyblade, making the prince laugh tremendously. Ven was probably doing better with the kid stuff because he was half a kid himself.

"Do you think that one day maybe I could have a sword like that?" Rupert asked.

"I don't know," Ven replied. "The Keyblade's a special thing. Terra?"

"He'd need to have an inheritance ceremony," Terra replied. "And Aqua's the only one here who can do that."

"Can't you?" Ven asked.

Terra shrugged. "I don't think it would be appropriate."

The kid frowned, quickly losing interest. He ran ahead, stabbing at imaginary enemies with his dagger.

"Terra, what's wrong?" Ven asked.

"Nothing," Terra said. "I just don't see the potential in him. I can ask Aqua if she sees something different, since her status of Master is unquestioned. But I've seen what potential looks like before, and I don't see it in him."

"Who have you seen it in before?"

"You," Terra said. "Plus, I'm the reason why Riku has a Keyblade. I saw it in him."

Ven laughed. "Arguably, I'm the reason Sora has a Keyblade."

Terra a laughed a little as well.

"Maybe I could do a mock one for him," Ven mused.

Terra started to respond, but was interrupted by Rupert.

"Back! Back you fiend!"

Terra gave a strangled gasp as he noticed all the Mega Shadows surrounding the boy.

"Oh no you don't," Ven declared, charging in.

Terra summoned his Keyblade as well, rushing to help.

"Get back," he told Rupert.

He was expecting an argument, but none came. The boy ran for cover quickly, allowing Terra and Ven free reign and mobility to get rid of the Heartless.

It didn't take long; Terra barely got into Critical Impact and Ven was merely just hacking and slashing. The last of the Heartless disappeared. Terra and Ven looked about, making sure there weren't any stragglers.

Terra looked down at his Keyblade. It was a habit he had developed recently. His Keyblade still had some ugly cracks, but it did look like it was mending.

He was oddly happy that Aqua's was cracked in places too; though hers was more from disuse than from…well, whatever his situation counted as.

Ven's Keyblade was in pristine condition. Terra speculated that this had something to do with Sora. He couldn't help but feel slightly jealous about this fact.

Rupert reappeared from around a rock that he had been hiding behind.

"You did a good job of staying out of the way," Ven said, looking over at him.

The boy shrugged. "Dad tells me to do stuff like that all the time."

"He's just trying to keep you from getting hurt," Terra said, ruffling the boy's hair.

Not surprisingly, the boy shrugged it off.

"Let's keep going," Ven said. "We still have to find the Keyhole."

"To the Dwarves' house!" Rupert declared.

"Why suggest that?" Terra asked.

"They always know stuff," the boy replied with a shrug.

"It's a good a place to start as any," Ven said.

"This way!" Rupert declared again, heading off.

Ven and Terra didn't have the heart to tell the kid that they already knew which way to go. They figured it was best to let him have his fun.

They had not gotten far when they were interrupted by another batch of Heartless. Rather than tell Rupert to run and hide again, Terra lifted him into a tree to get him out of the way. It was surprisingly effective.

Especially when the Heartless this time around didn't want to stop coming. Terra had already gone through Rockbreaker twice and Ven had been holding onto a Wingblade for quite some time, holding off on using the finisher for as long of feasibly possible.

The Heartless started catching on fire.

"Use your darn finishers!" Axel shouted.

Without even questioning it, Ven let loose a spin with all the additional Keyblade like substances he had gained and slashed down on a Neoshadow. Terra, who had just barely made it into Firestorm, added some more fire to the fray.

At that point, the Heartless didn't really stand a chance. Rupert cheered.

"What brings you here?" Ven asked, banishing his Keyblade.

"Came to tell you that I got one of the Keyholes sealed," Axel replied, his chakrams twirling lazily in his hands.

"What?" Terra asked. "Which one?"

"Enchanted Dominion," Axel said, banishing the chakrams in favor of resting his hands on his hips. "I was there earlier today and quite literally stumbled across it. Got Xion to come seal it for me. So, you won't have to go there for sealage."

"Good to know," Terra mused.

"Still working on finding this one?" Axel asked.

Ven and Terra both nodded.

"I wish you luck. I'd let you have an Assassin or two, but they're really only good for finding darkness. So, unless you happen to have a horde of Heartless surrounding the Keyhole like I did, they're not going to do you much good."

"I think we can probably manage it," Ven said, shrugging. "We were heading to the Dwarves' house, 'cause they might know where the Keyhole might be."

"Sounds like a bundle of fun," Axel said.

"Hey, can someone get me down from here?"

"Who's that?"

"The Crown Prince," Terra and Ven said simultaneously.

"Lovely," Axel said. "And as much as I'd love to stick around and help, I have about three other things that I need to do. Four, if you include watching Kairi chide Sora for fighting with his right hand."

Ven at least found that mildly amusing. Terra had gone to go get the Crown Prince out of the tree.

"See you later, then," Ven said. "Thanks for letting us know about the Enchanted Dominion."

Axel merely nodded before activating his star shard again.

"Does he do magic?" Rupert asked.

"What do you mean?" Terra asked.

"He was using fire without even speaking spells."

"Some people can do stuff like that," Terra said.

Ven tried to think how it was that Axel could use fire like he did. He didn't actually know. He'd have to ask sometime.

"He also disappears," the boy added.

"Well, anyone with a star shard can do that," Ven said. "Sometimes it happens without you even planning for it."

"Can you stop it?"

"Not if it goes off randomly," Ven said. "It's pretty special."

"Whoa!"

The boy was obviously intrigued.

"Maybe when you're bigger, you can try it," Terra said.

"Sweet!"

"Who goes there?" came a new voice.

"It's Doc!" Rupert said, jumping out of Terra's arms and running up to meet the dwarf. "Hi!"

"Why hello there, son," Doc said, patting the boy on the head. This time, the Prince didn't seem to have a problem with his hair being ruffled. "What brings you here?"

"These are my friends Terra and Ven," Rupert replied. "They're trying to find a giant Keyhole."

A second dwarf joined Doc.

"Hey, isn't that the man who controlled the darkness?" he asked, glaring at Terra.

Ven was about to argue on behalf of his friend, but Rupert beat him to it.

"Nonsense, Grumpy, Terra was helping fight the darkness, Ven too!"

Grumpy didn't seem convinced, but he did not argue further.

"So what's this you're after about a seahole? I mean, a Keyhole?"

"We're looking for a Keyhole that kind of looks out of place, like it's not on a door or anything, but somewhere else," Ven said. "It'll give off a mysterious feeling."

"Something with a funny feelin'?" Grumpy asked.

Ven nodded.

"Nope, never seen it," Grumpy said.

Terra sighed.

A third dwarf came and joined them all. He raised his hand.

"What is it, Dopey?" Doc asked.

He continued to keep one hand raised and pointed another hand in the direction of the mines.

"Do you know where the Keyhole is?" Ven asked.

Dopey nodded and started walking away.

"Guess we had better swallow—I mean, follow him," Doc said.

Ven and Terra started following Dopey without question. Doc and Rupert followed after them. Grumpy didn't follow at all, instead he went back into the house.


	22. Teeming with Trouble

**Author's Note: **Hello, again! Fast update? Well, they happen every now-and-then. I do try and update quick when I'm in the middle of a scene. And, this scene did take two chapters. Odd thought, the next chapter I post will probably be from Florida. O.O Well, maybe. I may try and get one up Saturday evening before I leave. I make no promises, however. :)

I'm kinda going slow for two reasons. One, is because I'm actually writing slow with everything going on in the real world. Two, is because I'm waiting for rar to catch up to me because we've got a crossover coming up and it'll be cooler if we both reach it at the same time... and I'm ahead of her.

But, anyway, regardless of that, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"Nothing we couldn't handle."<p>

xx

Dopey led them to the Diamond Mines. He was surprisingly focused as he walked. The Crown Prince walked up alongside him and they started playing a game of sorts. Doc kept an eye on the two of them out of habit. Ven and Terra brought up the rear of the party.

Terra summoned his Keyblade in advance, just to save that two seconds later on the very high chance that Heartless showed up. What Axel had said about a horde of Heartless surrounding the Keyhole worried him slightly. Ven kept his banished, however, enjoying the scenery.

Terra had to wonder how it was that Dopey knew where the Keyhole was. Generally, they were kept very hidden—mostly so not just anyone could stumble across one, but also to give the Heartless a harder time of getting at one. Heartless finding a Keyhole was not just detrimental—it was fatal to a world. Therefore, why would the world have its Keyhole in an easily accessible place?

Yet, somehow, Dopey knew where it was. Provided he was talking about _the _Keyhole.

Dopey marched on with purpose up until he got to the mines; then there was a bit of a mix-up on who had what lantern and who needed what match. Once that was all settled, however, the five of them made their way into the mine.

"Dopey, are you sure you know where we're going?" Doc asked, sounding a bit unsure of the operation as a whole.

Dopey merely nodded and kept walking.

Doc looked back at Ven and Terra and shrugged, almost in apology.

"Don't worry about it, Doc," Ven said. "He's the best lead we've had all afternoon. Even if it doesn't work, it'll be an afternoon well-spent."

"And, there's a chance that it will actually work," Terra added.

"That too," Ven replied.

After that initial exchange, the party moved through the mines in relative silence. Even Rupert stayed quiet. The only sounds were their footsteps on the rocky ground and the occasional droplet of water dripping from overhead.

The silence was actually becoming rather eerie.

"It's really quiet," Ven said, bringing more attention to this fact.

"Too quiet," Terra muttered.

"Ouch!" Ven said.

He turned around and found himself staring at a Novashadow.

"We've got Heartless!" he exclaimed, summoning his Keyblade.

"Help!" Rupert shouted.

"Oh no you don't," Terra growled, going straight for the Heartless that were trying to get at the boy.

Dopey picked up a stick and began whacking Heartless on the head. Doc pulled out a pickaxe and started attacking them that way.

As soon as there was a significant amount of free space around the Rupert, Terra looked over at Ven.

"Dimension Link!" he shouted. "But with your finisher."

"Yours is more powerful," Ven argued.

"We're also in a mine," Terra said. "Therefore, my finisher is dangerous."

"I see your point."

The two of linked hands.

"Power!"

Terra and Ven swiftly moved around the area, striking the Heartless with a flurry of attacks, both physical and magical: Quick Blitz, Strike Raid, Aero, Quick Blitz, Strike Raid, Sliding Dash, Aero, Blitz, Strike Raid, Sliding Dash, Blitz, Freeze Raid, Sliding Dash, Aerora, Cura.

Dopey and Rupert hid behind a rock. Doc still hacked away at any Heartless that came too close to his pickaxe.

Terra and Ven launched themselves into Air Dive, finishing off the last of the Heartless.

"Do you think we'll hit more before we get to the Keyhole?" Ven asked.

"There's a high chance of that," Terra replied. "Axel said he dealt with a whole horde."

"Right," Ven said, keeping his Keyblade out.

"Lead the may, I mean, way!" Doc said, nudging Dopey. "It's best we get this done as soon as possible."

Dopey nodded emphatically and started off deeper into the Mines again. Terra went next, then the Crown Prince, then Ven, then Doc.

They had only been walking a few minutes when more Heartless appeared. Dopey concentrated for a second, then shrunk all of them.

"Thank you!" Ven said, taking out every single Heartless within range.

Terra cast a few Thunders and got himself into Thunder Bolt. Between that and Ven's hack-slash, this round of Heartless was eliminated rather quickly. Doc threw up a group Cure for everyone.

Terra looked at Dopey. "How much farther?"

Dopey pointed down the left fork in an upcoming tunnel split.

"Not too jar, I mean, far, then," Doc said.

Dopey took this as the cue to march on. The rest of them followed after. However, they stopped when they got to an empty open room. Terra and Ven exchanged glances, both very wary of the emptiness.

When the barrier went up behind them, and also on the entrance on the other side of the room, Ven and Terra's anxiousness only increased.

A giant rock-like Heartless seemingly pulled itself from the surrounding wall.

"I'll go find a rock to hide behind," Rupert muttered.

"You two going to help?" Ven asked, looking at the two dwarves.

"Of course!" Doc stuttered.

Dopey merely nodded.

"Let loose with everything you've got," Terra said.

"You speak like I'd hold back!" Ven goaded.

Terra laughed and cast three Firas in quick succession, moving quickly into Firestorm.

Ven took a moment to notice that the rock-Heartless didn't seem to be particularly susceptible to Fire. Terra was doing some damage, but not nearly enough. Not able to think of any specific form of magic that the rock thing _would _be susceptible to, Ven just launched himself over and let loose a flurry of physical attacks: Sliding Dash, Strike Raid, and Quick Blitz being some of his favorites.

Therefore, it didn't take him very long to get himself into Fever Pitch. He increased the speed of his physical attacks.

Doc carefully made his way over and focused on hacking the Heartless' feet to bits. This seemed to really bother it and Doc became a very frequent target.

Dopey decided that he'd just stand by and Cure anyone who looked particularly tired.

Given the fact that Ven and Terra had charged into this not wanting to hold anything back and Doc was a frequent target, it worked very well.

Terra pulled a Thunder Edge and had to appreciate the irony of going into Rockbreaker. This would be heavily effective. Ven had been using a lot of reprisals and it was therefore no surprise when his phantom Keyblades appeared behind him.

By the time both of them activated their finishers, the rock-Heartless was finished.

"Well, that was effective," Doc said, shouldering his axe.

Dopey cast another Cure for the group, applauding as he did.

The barriers fell down. Terra and Ven took one look at each other, nodded, and headed forward. Doc grabbed Rupert and followed after, Dopey bringing up the rear.

The next room was just as quiet as the last one; however, no barriers came up as they passed through the entryway. No Heartless appeared either. Terra banished his blade. Ven was about to, but then his blade started glowing with light. He held his Keyblade up; the prongs seemed to reach to the ceiling of their own accord. The five of them looked up to see a tiny little Keyhole on the ceiling.

A beam of light connected Ven's blade to the Keyhole. With a whoosh of air, the Keyhole sealed.

"Well, well, that was interesting," Terra said.

"Not too many Heartless in the way either," Ven said.

"Yes, but now that you've spoiled, I mean foiled, the Heartless, they'll go after whatever they can," Doc said.

Ven and Terra exchanged looks of horror.

"The Princess!"

"What about my sister?" Rupert asked.

"Not your sister, your mother," Terra said, scooping the boy up. "Come on, Ven, we have to go make sure…"

"Less talking, more running."

"Do you need our assistance?" Doc asked.

"No, we've got it covered," Ven said. "See you 'round!"

The two boys started off at a dead-run.

"Why don't we just star-shard?" Ven asked.

"Too unpredictable," was the answer.

They didn't need to worry about how fast they were running. They had only barely made it to the opening of the Mines when their Wayfinders began to glow. The Wayfinders grew brighter and brighter, and suddenly, it was like the three of them were flying.

xx

Aqua was actually enjoying cooking. She had never cooked a pie before, but it wasn't as hard as she had originally thought. Either that, or Snow White was just a good teacher.

The last batch of pies was in the oven. That's when the trouble started.

First, it was just the Shadows. But then the Shadows got bigger, and started bringing friends. It was all Aqua could do to keep them out of the kitchen, much less the rest of the castle.

"I don't understand," Snow White said, taking a broom to a smaller Shadow. "We've never had problems before."

"Something's changed in the balance of the world," Aqua said, slashing through several of them with her Keyblade. "I can only hope this is a temporary change because Ven and Terra got to the Keyhole."

"Mommy! Help!" came the Princess' cries.

"Ophelia!" Snow White screamed.

"Come on," Aqua said, looking at the Queen. "We've got to help her."

Snow White stole a glance at the pies.

"The Heartless don't want those. Come on! I'm not leaving you here!"

Snow White turned back to Aqua and gave a determined nod. Aqua breathed a small sigh of relief and the two women took off.

Ophelia was standing in the middle of the courtyard surrounded by roughly six Neoshadows. In general, six of them weren't too bad. But, for the little girl, they were completely traumatizing.

"Judgment!" Aqua shouted, tossing her Keyblade. It spiraled around the Heartless, taking them all out.

Only for more to show up.

Aqua frowned as she caught her Keyblade, not liking the situation one bit. She felt someone run up behind her and she spun around. It was only the King, but it was someone.

"Get your wife and daughter and run," she told him. "I'll take care of the Heartless."

The King didn't have to be told twice.

Of course, the Heartless were after the strongest heart in the vicinity: Snow White's. Aqua tried to provide a distraction for them to get away, but it wasn't enough.

"Terra!" she shouted. "Ven!"

As if they had come to her call, two lights appeared around her. Within seconds, the two lights took the forms of Terra and Ven. Terra was carrying the Crown Prince.

Terra took one look at the situation and passed Rupert along to his father. Then he turned back to Aqua and Ven.

"Shall we take care of this mess?" he asked.

"Let's do it!" Ven exclaimed.

"Yes, let's," Aqua added.

"Power!"

Three flurries of attacks later, there was only a lone Shadow left. It clawed at Snow White's feet and the King took it out with his sword.

"Thank you!" Snow White said.

"No problem," Terra said. "You're safe now."

"Did you seal the Keyhole?" Aqua asked.

"Ven did," Terra said, looking over at Ven.

Ven grinned.

"That's great, Ven. How bad was getting to it?"

"Nothing we couldn't handle," Ven replied, putting his hands behind his head casually.

"Thank you," the King added. "It means a lot to us."

"Really, it's nothing," Ven said. "We're just doing our job."

Snow White pulled away from her daughter, who was clinging to her skirts. She came up to Aqua, Terra and Ventus and gave each of them a kiss on the cheek.

"You are welcome to come back any time, remember that," she said, smiling.

"Of course!" Aqua said.

"Any time!" Ven added.

"We'll visit," Terra promised.

"You'd better!" Rupert said. This made everyone laugh.


	23. A Forgotten Remnant

**Author's Note: **Oh my gosh I go to Florida tomorrow! This...is... happening. Wow. Okay. Well, as my treat to you all before I leave, here's a chapter!

Nothing much to say, it's Axel. And he speaks for himself.

* * *

><p>"I'm getting the creeps standing here."<p>

xx

Though he had not said it out loud, he had explicitly thought: 'Take me to somewhere where I can learn more about Kuin' as he had activated the star shard.

"I wonder if it worked," Axel mused, opening his eyes after the star shard had landed.

He found himself in Hollow Bastion. He was right in front of a shop with a giant book as the sign. It was a Library of sorts. Axel looked around to see if there was anything else of interest nearby. There wasn't, not unless he was supposed to go to the Art Store. He shoved the star shard back into his pocket and walked in.

He blanched when he saw Vexen. Or, rather, a Vexen Replica. Vexen never pulled his hair back. Ever.

"Why, hello, Axel, how may I help you?"

_Definitely _a Vexen Replica. And possibly a newer one, they freaked out less when they saw him.

"Well," Axel began. "I was just looking for some…"

He was interrupted by the sound of someone coming down the stairs rather quickly. He was only mildly shocked to see Zexion.

"Thought I smelled you," he said.

Axel nearly laughed at the greeting. Zexion hadn't changed a bit.

"I see you're still alive," he said.

Zexion nodded. "Xigbar thought he'd be kind enough to arrange for my escape. I came here and hid under Xehanort's nose for a couple weeks. Then, well, the Keyblade Wielders took care of Xehanort and I haven't been particularly worried about his returning after _that _departure."

"Hey, I helped," Axel said. "In Xehanort's destruction."

"How intriguing," Pi said.

The other two ignored him.

"What brings you here?" Zexion asked.

"Well, you might know," Axel said.

"Know what?"

"Stuff about light corridors and the gliders that make them."

Zexion frowned. "How did you hear of them?"

"Saw one myself, so don't tell me they don't exist."

Zexion frowned. "I wasn't going to. They most certainly exist. Well, existed. You say that there's at least one left, though?"

Axel frowned. "Well, I know of one person, with one glider, who uses light corridors to go from world to world. She says it takes her where she needs to go."

Zexion seemed highly intrigued.

"I might be able to tell you something."

"You're kidding me. How is it, that _you, _of all people, end up knowing something about her? Why didn't I just ask you first? Oh, that's right, I thought you were dead."

Zexion didn't appear to be paying much attention to Axel's frustration. "How old would you say she is?" he asked.

Axel shrugged. "I have no clue!"

"Older than Roxas?"

"Yes."

"Older than you?"

"I have a really skewed concept of my own age, you know that, buddy!"

Zexion frowned at him.

"Probably younger, when you take into account all the years I didn't age," Axel said, after a moment.

"Being a Nobody seems to make things so confusing," Pi interjected. "Good thing I'm a replica."

They ignored him.

"I'll split the difference," Zexion said, sighing.

He summoned a book to him and started flipping through it.

"You make good research incredibly hard, do you know that?" he added, not even looking up at Axel over the book.

Axel rolled his eyes. "Well, ex_cuse_ me."

Then, he frowned when he realized what the title of the book was.

"Is that _A History of Xehanort_?" he asked, dumbfounded.

"Yes."

"How the he—?" Axel began.

"Magic," Zexion replied, snapping the book shut.

"How is something about a light corridor going to be in Xehanort's history?"

"Xehanort lived a rather long life, and he had his fingers everywhere. Do you wish to learn more about your light corridor person?"

"Yes."

"I assume you have a star shard?"

"Yes."

"Good, that will make it easier."

"Let me guess, you're coming too?"

Zexion nodded. Axel sighed.

"I suppose I really have no choice if I want to learn more about her."

"Can I come?" Pi asked.

"No."

"Watch the shop while I'm gone," Zexion said, coming around the counter to where Axel was standing. He put a hand on Axel's shoulder.

"Where are we going?"

"Tell it to take us to her childhood home. If we're extrapolating her age correctly, this would be the best place to start. If it ends up leading us down a dead-end road, we can try her birthplace."

"All right then," Axel said, activating the star shard again.

If he was as lucky as he had been the past few times today, this would work.

It didn't appear to at first, for the two men appeared in what looked like rubble. It stretched on for miles. There wasn't anything intact in sight. The air was heavy and still. Nothing made a sound.

"It smells like Xehanort," Zexion said after a moment.

A closer look revealed the scars that only darkness could leave.

"Xehanort destroyed her childhood home?" Axel asked. "I'm having a hard time believing this."

Zexion didn't to be having a problem doing so, however.

"Zexion, you have got to be kidding me right now," Axel said.

"Ienzo."

"What?"

"I go by Ienzo now, or, rather, again."

"Whatever," Axel said. "You are _not _believing this, are you? Look around! For _miles _there is nothing but rubble. What does this tell us about her?"

"It tells us that she didn't steal the glider."

"What's so special about that glider? Aside from the fact that it makes light corridors and no one wants to give me a straight answer about it—and that's when they admit it exists."

"Simply put, it comes down to the glider," Zexion (Ienzo) said, looking up at Axel with one clear blue eye. (The other was covered by his hair.)

"Enlighten me," Axel said, feeling that it would be pointless to repeat the question about what was so special about the darn glider.

"Those gliders belonged to a set of people who were charged with keeping the balance of the light and darkness in the universe."

"Keyblade Wielders?"

"No, they're different. Mostly because even though the Keyblade chooses the Wielder, there are still many ways to bring about the Wielder. The Universe itself picked this set of people. And, if they started straying too far off the middle road—either to the light or the dark, they would die. As opposed to Keyblade Wielders, who could typically get away with going too far in one direction."

"Example, please," Axel said.

"Xehanort."

"Ah. Valid. Does this group of people have a name?"

"Not that I have been able to find. You could ask the girl, but I doubt she would tell you. However, seeing this place destroyed certainly confirms that she not only grew up here, and that Xehanort destroyed the place, but she escaped with probably the only glider left unharmed."

Axel started putting this new information alongside what he already knew about Kuin.

"She's going to hate me," he said.

"Why?"

"If you are right, which you probably are; she's been charged with keeping the balance, and I'm so dead in her eyes."

"Does it matter beyond your want of self-preservation?"

"Well, that certainly matters," Axel said. "And let's just leave it there."

Ienzo didn't believe him entirely, but he didn't press the issue.

"So, would you like to explain to me why this place smells like Xehanort? I mean, obviously he killed the place. But, why?"

"What you know about him already should answer that."

"I don't know crap about Xehanort. Not nearly as much as you do, or Xigbar does, or Saix did. I could fill _two _history books of information I don't know about Xehanort."

The mere facts that Xigbar was alive and Saix was not were not missed by Ienzo, but he chose not to comment on them. Rather, he decided it was best to stick to the subject matter. Axel would thank him for it later, anyways.

"Xehanort wanted absolute power," he said. "Think about what would stand in his way."

Axel looked around him. "Oh. But, if they were supposed to keep the balance, wouldn't they be able to stop him?"

"How many forces have fallen before Xehanort?" Ienzo asked. "How many men, women and children have lost their lives because of him? How low was he _not _willing to go?"

Axel didn't have to look much farther than programming Xion to kill Roxas to get his answer. However, everything that Riku and Terra had dealt with only added to the issue.

And that wasn't including all the stuff that Axel already admitted he didn't know.

"My prediction is," Ienzo said quietly. "Xehanort came for her people, her family. She grabbed a glider and escaped. For I doubt he would have let her live out of compassion for a child. She could not have been more than ten. In fact, she was probably younger."

Axel had a weird feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"It explains so much," he muttered. "But I feel like I should have learned it from her."

Ienzo laughed. "Would she have told you?"

"Probably not. Not even if I threatened to kill her."

"Especially not if you threatened to kill her."

"So, would you say that she's the only one left of her people?"

"Xehanort was generally thorough with his work. The fact that she survives at all is quite the feat."

"Is that why everyone was so ridiculous about telling me stuff?" Axel asked. "Yen Sid even said that light corridors had not existed in his lifetime."

Ienzo snorted. "While that is not entirely true, there is some merit to it. If I remember correctly, after the Keyblade War, most of these people decided to stay under the radar. Things like light corridors and the gliders that made them would disappear into legend—much like many stories about the Keyblade."

"And this is why I'm glad I _don't _have that responsibility," Axel muttered.

"But you still have to worry about her not killing you."

"Shut up."

Ienzo shrugged.

Axel sighed and looked around the barren world once again. He shifted on his feet and heard the crunch of glass beneath him.

"Of course," he muttered, bending down to see what he had stepped on.

It was a picture frame. The picture inside made Axel's stomach twist in knots. There were three people in the picture. There was a man, a woman, and a little girl who looked no more than six-years-old. All three of them had purple hair and emerald green eyes. The girl in the middle was unmistakably Kuin.

Axel didn't have to think twice about pocketing the picture. He turned to Ienzo.

"Thank you," he said. "I wouldn't have found this without you. Nor would I have been able to piece it together."

"You've changed, Axel," Ienzo mused. "A year or two ago, you would not have considered thanking me in the slightest."

Axel shrugged. "Times have changed."

"That they have, that they have."

"Well, I should probably take you back to Hollow Bastion now," Axel said. "I'm getting the creeps standing here."

Ienzo nodded. "If there is anything else I can answer for you, just let me know."

"I plan on it. You told me more in a half hour than five other people told me in a week."

Ienzo couldn't help but feel a little proud about that.

And, on that note, the two men returned to Hollow Bastion.


	24. The Secret Whispers

**Author's Note: **Hi! I'm alive! If you read my blog this morning, you'd already know that... but that's not the point. I HAS ANOTHER CHAPTER FOR YOU! This is the companion chapter to the last one. Kuin's doing this at the exact same time as Axel was heading to Hollow Bastion and then Kuin's home world. Anywho, I think this chapter pretty much speaks for itself like the last one did. Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"He very well could be a great mastermind."<p>

xx

She pulled out her glider and hopped on.

"_Dom a __ghlacadh__ leis an mbunachar sonraí,_" she muttered, stomping on the navigator.

A light corridor appeared, shimmering with colors.

"See you around, Axel," she said, turning to get one last look at him.

"See you 'round," he replied, saluting her.

She found herself smiling as she kicked the glider into motion and flew through the corridor.

She arrived precisely where she wanted to: right in front of the Database of the _Gaian_. Somehow, it had escaped destruction. Perhaps _he _had planned on using it for his own means. In fact, there was quite a good chance that _he_ had at some point or another. But if what Axel had said was true, then _he _was gone and she wouldn't have to worry about _him _taking a blade through her back.

She cracked her knuckles. Now for the moment of truth. How much was in the database about Axel? This thing hadn't been updated in thirteen years now, it was certainly outdated. She keyed in the override password and pulled up a search query. She typed _'Axel' _in the search box.

Nothing came up. This surprised her. She had been expecting outdated entries of Axel from a decade or so ago. But the name itself did not have any hits.

"Of _course _he wouldn't be using his real name," she muttered. "Because that would be too easy."

She racked her brain for other things he had said, anything that might give her a clue. Well, he _had _said something about the Organization. She started typing that into the database, but then she remembered that the Organization had really only existed for barely a decade—_after _this database had been last updated. She frowned at her rotten luck.

Drumming her fingers on the edge of the keyboard, she tried to come up with a clue—any clue as to who Axel was or had been.

Then it hit her. The 'X', the Organization, the Nobodies. All of the Organization members had 'X's in their names. He'd even been wearing one of their cloaks.

That didn't automatically mean he had been in the Organization, but there were enough clues pointing in that direction. She pursed her lips, trying to remember the formula for Organization member's names.

Take the name, mix it up, stick an 'X' in it. So, to go backwards, she'd just need to take the 'X' out and unscramble the letters. Thankfully, Axel had a short name, so it shouldn't take too long. She began typing in different combinations of the letters 'a,' 'e,' and 'l,' seeing what results she could pull up.

Within a minute, she had a promising hit.

_Lea_.

He had been a resident of Radiant Garden. The picture in the file held an unmistakable resemblance to Axel. The eyes, the hair, the facial structure. He had been reported missing prior to the destruction of Radiant Garden, and then had been filed dead after said destruction.

The only thing that didn't make sense was that he seemed too old in this picture.

It only took her a couple more minutes of thinking to figure that one out. The Organization had been made up of Nobodies. Arguably, Nobodies didn't age. So, Axel had been frozen in that physical age for quite some time now. Provided he was, in fact, a Nobody. But, nothing else would explain the lack of significant age gap.

She frowned. If he was, in fact, a Nobody, and then additionally a part of the Organization, she theoretically had to kill him; because the Organization was against the balance. Though they claimed to be 'nothingness,' they were still on the side closer to the darkness.

Unless, Axel was different. He _had _said that he didn't want her to know his past. He had suspected that she was against the darkness and had wanted her to see him for what he was, not for what he had been.

So who was he now?

She was going to get permanent wrinkles with the way her brow was furrowed.

It wasn't like she was against the darkness, per se. Rather, she was against disrupting the balance. In today's day and age, the darkness was disrupting the balance more than the light was. This was mostly because of _him_, but there were other contributors. The darkness was more restless than the light. It usually struck first, goading the light to strike back. When the light struck back in full force, there were still complications because of the imbalance. Even Holy could do damage.

There was a reason why the seven people with the purest hearts were girls in demure positions. They weren't the 'Princesses of Heart' for nothing.

Kuin banged her fist on the keyboard in frustration. Nothing was making sense anymore. Her entire worldview was being disrupted. How did people like Axel fit into the balance of the universe? And what the _shib _was she supposed to do about it?

The simple answer was, he didn't. But she wanted him to. She didn't want to have to kill him since he had given her no reason to. If she had stumbled across him a year or so ago, when the Organization was at the peak of its power, then she might have had more incentive to kill him.

But she had been avoiding the Organization because of _him_.

"_Cad ba mhaith leat as dom, cruinne_?" she screamed.

Naturally, there was no answer.

Since the universe wasn't going to answer her questions, she figured she might as well learn more about Axel. However, there was one more thing she wanted to check.

He had said the names 'Roxas' and 'Xion'. She wanted to see if she could find them. She started with the boy. She didn't even have to try more than once. As soon as she had taken the 'X' out of the name, she recognized the name. _Sora. _

A four-year-old kid from Destiny Islands. He'd probably only been made a Nobody recently, since she'd been hearing things about him mere months ago. It didn't quite add up, but there wasn't anything she'd be able to learn from this database.

It didn't help that there wasn't any results for the combinations of the letters 'i,' 'o,' and 'n.' None, whatsoever.

She needed to go to a better database. Preferably one that the Organization had used quite avidly. She logged off this database and pulled out her glider again.

"_Caisleán oblivion_," she said, stepping on the navigator.

If Castle Oblivion wasn't good enough, she'd have to go to The World That Never Was. Though, there was a tad too close to _him _for comfort. Even if _he _was dead.

She flew through the corridor and appeared in an almost-blinding-white hallway. She squinted from the sudden change of lighting. Castle Oblivion was an odd place.

"Excuse me, miss, how may I help you?"

It took every bit of her self-control _not _to pull her gun on the blonde man that had come up to her. He _had _asked if he could help. But she hadn't wanted to be seen. And he was wearing one of those cloaks!

"No," she said. "I must have just arrived in the wrong place. Pardon me."

He shook his head and clucked his tongue. "No one comes to Castle Oblivion without a reason. Just because you did not decide to come here does not mean that there is something you can't gain from here."

His double negatives were confusing her.

"Fine, whatever," she said. "I'm trying to find out more about a man named Axel."

The man in front of her winced. Visibly. This did not bode well.

"Pardon my reaction, miss. My name is Vexen Replica 34. Why do you wish to know more about Axel?"

"I'm trying to understand him, to be completely honest."

34 snorted. "Let me show you to our camera feeds. If that is not enough, I might be able to let you see some files in the database."

Kuin frowned. "Really? That easily?"

34 laughed. "If you wish to know more about Axel, I really see no need to stop you. The information we have on him here is stuff that he openly paraded about during his time in the Organization. The only thing we cannot tell you is his motivations. You are more than welcome to try and figure _those _out, Miss."

Kuin frowned. Axel hadn't wanted her to know his life's story, yet here she was, poking around. She told herself she did not care. Though a small part of her did.

34 led her over to a black glowing orb. It was the darkest thing in the room aside from the black cloak that he was wearing. He placed his hand on the orb and gestured that she do the same. She was skeptical.

"It's either this or we take the stairs," 34 said.

Kuin put her hand on the orb as well, grumbling as she did so.

They appeared in yet another hallway, the only difference was that this one had more doors. It was rather obvious as to why people could get lost in this place.

34 led her directly to a particular room. It was full of TV screens showing different feeds from presumably all over the castle. 34 walked over to a computer on a different wall and made a few clicks and gestures.

"Every recording about Axel you would ever need," he said. "I will let you start with those. I only ask that you tell me what you think his motivations were, because I would love to know myself. Let me know if you need anything."

He bowed himself out of the room. Kuin decided that he at least scored a couple of points in her book for politeness, however odd he might be. She cracked her knuckles and made herself comfortable to sit and watch the videos.

She had been probably watching for about a half hour, enough to get quite the idea of what the Organization had originally seized Castle Oblivion for. She was feeling quite bad towards the little girl, Namine. She had worked up quite a dislike for the blonde chick, Larxene. And she was seriously disliking the fact that she had helped out the pink haired man. Though, now she was wondering if it had, in fact, been Axel who had exiled him there.

_"Remember the order? You must eliminate the traitor."_

"Why, Axel, you cunning son of a gun," Kuin muttered.

_"I always follow orders, Marluxia."_

"That's how he did it," she mused to herself. "He justified everything by blaming the orders he was given."

After watching Sora and Axel fight, and Axel fake a loss, she decided to find videos farther in the future.

She caught several of Axel turning the cameras off, which was intriguing. Then, nothing for months. And that clip was short, involving Axel showing up with the boy named Roxas. The boy passed out and they left.

Intrigued, Kuin stopped her search on Axel and looked for clips of Roxas. He was supposedly Sora's Nobody… so how was that working with everything else?

Fifteen minutes of searching later, she discovered that somehow, despite being Somebody and Nobody, Sora and Roxas both existed at the same time; and they were two separate people. They also both Wielded. And Axel was associated with both of them, so she figured her research still had merit.

These were all things that she had extrapolated from the videos alone. She hadn't even asked about the database.

She sat back, taking a moment to think. She hadn't had any 'aha' moments, where everything fit into place. Everything just was sort of conglomerating around the ideas that she had already formed about him.

She had at least come to the conclusion that she wasn't supposed to kill him. Or, at least, that she didn't feel she had to as of yet. She went back to her video watching, deciding to work her way backwards this time around. A dinner with a ridiculous amount of people… clothing… him looking rather miffed as he sat along a wall… a rather pained expression on his face as he watched the darkness consume someone… a rather nasty-looking injury… obtaining said nasty-looking injury.

She looked up the blue-haired man. His name was Saix. He and Axel had been friends.

The videos weren't giving her enough anymore. She needed the full database.

She was about to get up out of her seat and poke her head out the door to find 34, when he came in.

"Tea?"

Well, _that _certainly went on her list of most random things.

"Sure."

"34 said you'd been in here for a while, I thought you might like a refreshment."

"But, wait… you're not 34?"

The Vexen Replica shook his head. "No, I am 27."

"Ah, right, replicas," she muttered. That, at least she understood. "Do you think you could let me into the database? I'm trying to find out more about Saix, now, actually."

"Oh, not a problem in the slightest," 27 said, maneuvering past her. He entered a couple of passwords and then backed away. "She's just about all yours. There are a few things that we can't let people access, but you should be able to learn what you need about Saix, certainly."

"Thank you," Kuin said, taking a sip of her tea.

"My pleasure. 34 wants to know if you have figured out his motivations?"

"Self-preservation," Kuin replied. "And having a little bit of fun."

"So, not a great mastermind?"

"I never said that," she said. "He very well could be."

"Very well then, enjoy the data," he nodded, heading for the door.

"I plan on it," she said with a grin before turning back to the computer.


	25. A Very Small Wish

__**Author's Note: **Nothing much to say... really... I love this chapter. It's adorable. Enjoy.

* * *

><p>"I am going to murder Selphie."<p>

xx

The metallic clangs of Oathkeeper and Oblivion striking against each other permeated the small island. Not even the cheers from the four spectators could drown them out. Xion, Selphie, Tidus and Wakka all sat on the Paopu tree, cheering Sora and Roxas on. Xion was the only one cheering for Roxas. Selphie, Tidus and Wakka all gave their cheers to Sora. Though, everyone knew that if Riku showed up and joined the fight, the three of them would give their cheers in favor of Riku.

"Take that," Roxas said, performing a spin attack.

Sora threw up his Keyblade to block it, then flipped back. He charged back at Roxas and the two of them began a flurry of hack-and-slash again.

_Clang. Cling. Cwang. _

Roxas knocked Sora back and there was a _whoosh _of air as Sora recovered himself.

"This is _way _more exciting than watching Riku and Sora fight!" Tidus exclaimed.

"But what if we were to watch them fight, _now_?" Selphie argued. "I bet Riku knows all this stuff too!"

Almost subconsciously, Sora threw up a Cure for himself, though it was hardly necessary.

"Sure," Roxas taunted. "You'll remember to Cure when you're fighting me, but Riku and I have got to keep an eye on you when we're fighting Heartless!"

"I'm not that bad, am I?" Sora asked.

Roxas and Xion both nodded.

"Oh."

Roxas took advantage of Sora's distraction and aimed a rather good blow at him. Sora barely had time to block it.

"Come on!" Sora shouted, putting all his strength into the counterattack.

Oblivion flew up into the air. Before Roxas could catch it, Sora called it to him.

"Oh, no fair," Roxas said, shaking his head.

Sora lazily twirled Oblivion, a grin on his face.

"Sora! Sora! Sora!" came the cheers of Selphie, Tidus and Wakka.

"You asked for it," Roxas said, cracking his knuckles.

The next three attacks were massive light attacks. The last of which almost knocked Sora off the island and came very close to hitting those on the Paopu tree.

"Watch it! Roxas!" Xion shouted, redirecting the light. "You'll hurt the bystanders!"

"Well, what else am I supposed to do? He's got my Keyblade and I can't summon it when it's in his hand!"

Xion summoned her Keyblade and tossed it to him.

"Don't get that one stolen too," she told him.

Roxas grinned and went after Sora, who had only just recovered from nearly falling off the island.

The clangs of three Keyblades now filled the air. A couple more light attacks, albeit smaller ones, and some more hacking and slashing later: Sora and Roxas' Keyblades were locked against each other, neither backing off.

"Remind you of something?" Roxas asked.

"Never will forget it," Sora responded.

Roxas smirked.

Sora pulled Oathkeeper away and slammed it down on the Kingdom Key. Then he alternated with Oblivion. Then Oathkeeper, then Oblivion.

"Where'd you learn… that attack?" Roxas asked, holding up the Kingdom Key with all of his might.

"You," Sora responded, catching the Kingdom Key and flipping it out of Roxas' hands.

He was about to summon it to him as well, but Xion beat him to it.

"My Keyblade," she said, sticking her tongue out as she banished her Keyblade.

"I think," Roxas said, panting. "You just might have one this round."

"Sora! What are you doing!" came Kairi's shout as she ran across the bridge to the island.

"Sparring," Sora replied, grinning.

"With your busted hand?" she shrieked.

Sora cast a glance down at his right hand, which was still wrapped heavily in bandages.

"It doesn't hurt," he told her.

"That doesn't matter!" she said. "Tifa said not to use it for _weeks_! It hasn't even been _two _weeks yet!"

"Would it make you feel better if I told you I had been fighting left-handed?" Sora asked.

"You've got two Keyblades right now," Kairi chided. "I can't believe that in the slightest. And, given the fact that Oathkeeper's in your right hand, I'd say you've been fighting right-handed this whole time."

Sora flushed bright red.

Kairi turned to Xion.

"He's been fighting right-handed," she said. "But don't give me that glare because I didn't stop him. I didn't know. I wasn't paying attention when he was getting it bandaged. I was getting my arm rebuilt."

Selphie, Tidus and Wakka all gaped at her, but she ignored them. She leapt off the Paopu tree and tucked her hair behind her ears. Kairi sighed and turned her glare back to Sora. He banished Oathkeeper and scratched the back of his head sheepishly.

"I'm not going to mention the time with the Drive Forms," Roxas muttered in Sora's ear, snatching Oblivion back.

"What?" Kairi asked, her eyes going wide.

"Just don't worry about it," Sora told her, walking over to her. "If you want, you can take a look at it and see how bad it is. But I'm telling the truth when I say it doesn't hurt."

She sighed.

"I think it's best we leave," Xion said, looking over at Roxas.

"Well, I would, but they're blocking the bridge."

Selphie, Wakka and Tidus had not even moved from the Paopu tree.

Riku and Namine suddenly appeared in the center of the island.

"And here I thought this would be a better place to land," Riku said, looking about.

Namine was gripping onto his arm rather tightly, but he didn't seem to care. Xion couldn't help but notice that Namine looked a little pale. She didn't get a chance to say anything about it, though.

"Riku!" Selphie exclaimed. "You should fight Sora! Show us what you've got!"

Riku took one look at Sora, Sora's hand, and the look on Kairi's face, and shook his head.

"No way," he said. "I'm not going to risk injuring Sora further."

"Hey! I'm not that bad!" Sora argued, frowning.

Riku just shrugged.

"Well, if they're looking for a fight," Xion said. "You could fight one of us."

"Or both," Tidus said. "Riku's proven he can take on three people at once and still win before."

Riku smirked. However, his face softened when he looked down at Namine.

"Will you be all right?" he asked.

She nodded and smiled. "Of course! I'm feeling much better after that soup."

Riku snorted. "Yeah, all three helpings."

She smiled, as if she couldn't help it. She let go of Riku's arm and pulled a brand new silver pencil out from behind her ear and a sketchbook out from her bag. She went over and took the spot that Xion had previously been occupying on the Paopu tree. She made herself comfortable.

"Go for it, if you want," she said.

Riku smirked again and summoned his Keyblade. Roxas and Xion did likewise.

"I came over here because I wanted to show you something," Kairi said, turning to look at Sora once more. "But I totally just ruined the moment by yelling at you."

"It's okay," Sora said, shrugging it off. "I kind of deserved it. What was it that you wanted to show me?"

"Come on!" she said, grinning. She grabbed onto his left hand and started dragging him back over the bridge.

Namine watched them go and smiled. She had a pretty good idea what was coming, she'd drawn the two of them in the Secret Place earlier that day. She turned her attention back to Riku. He was, indeed, taking on both Roxas and Xion and doing a very good job of it.

Meanwhile, Kairi led Sora to the Secret Place.

"I have to show you something!" she exclaimed. "I meant to show you sooner, like _way _sooner. Like, before we went to defeat Xehanort, sooner."

"I bet I've already seen it," he teased.

"Nu-uh!" she retorted. "Have you?" she asked, suddenly not so sure.

"I'm not saying. You just show me and I'll let you know."

She frowned. "If you've already seen it…"

"I can act surprised."

"It's not the same."

"Just show it to me."

Kairi pulled back the leaves that had grown over the opening. The two of them walked in. Instinctively, the two of them walked directly to the picture with the Paopu fruits.

Sora tried to act surprised about the second Paopu, but Kairi saw right through it.

"When did you see this?" she asked.

"Remember when I came back with Riku after fighting Xemnas?"

She nodded.

"I walked around this whole Island probably twice, just enjoying the fact that it was still around. I hadn't been home in so long, that I reveled in every moment. I came in here and I saw that you had added the second Paopu, and I couldn't help but smile."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Why didn't you tell me you had seen the first one?"

"You were asleep."

"Oh. Right."

"When did you add the first one, anyway?" she asked.

"Right before Destiny Islands fell into darkness," Sora said, his face flushing. "I was actually jealous of Riku. I wanted to make it seem like you and I would have our destinies intertwined. It was right before we were supposed to go out on the raft."

A tear fell down her cheek. "Aw! Sora!"

"When did you add the second one?"

"Right after I saw that you had added the first. Which was right after Destiny Islands had been restored. I wandered this island a bit, and I came in here and stumbled across it…"

Sora grinned and put an arm around her. She leaned into his chest. They both smiled and sighed.

"Sora, do you really want our destinies to be intertwined forever?" she asked, looking up at him.

"Only if you want to. But, according to Selphie, you said you wanted to have a family with me."

"I did?" Kairi thought about this for a moment. "No, Selphie took that out of context. I told her that having a family would still be possible in my line of work… I never explicitly…"

"You are blushing!" Sora exclaimed. "You _want_…"

She buried her face in his chest. She muttered an argument, but it was very incomprehensible.

"I'm sorry I embarrassed you," he said.

"It's fine."

"Hey, I know this is random, but there's a new drawing."

She pulled away from him. "What do you mean?"

Sora pointed to the wall over by the old door. There was a drawing there, Namine standing next to Riku.

"Namine must have drawn it," Kairi mused.

She wandered over to the drawing and traced the outlines of it with her fingertips, admiring the artwork.

"When was she here?" Sora mused, coming up behind her.

"Oh, I think she and Riku came here a couple mornings after we got back."

"Huh, interesting."

"Well, I think it's really sweet, because there's a picture of us with Paopu fruits, and now there's a picture of the two of them holding hands."

"It looks like he's protecting her," Sora mused.

Kairi giggled.

"Was that funny?" Sora asked.

"No, I'm just laughing at the fact that Namine doesn't particularly need protecting anymore. She can really take care of herself. She could take care of both herself and me even before she could shatter anyone's memories."

Sora hugged Kairi.

"So, you and me and a family?"

Kairi's face flushed as bright as her hair.

"I'm not saying you have to answer now," he said, his voice light and joking. "I was just teasing."

"I am going to murder Selphie."

Sora laughed. "Now _that _I'd have to see."


	26. Larxene's Sneer

**Author's Note: **Hey! So, chapter! This is happening simultaneously with everything else going on in the other stories. In other news, everyone needs to go see the new KH3D trailer. I'd put a link up, but ff would block it. Erm, I think that's all I have to say, I think.

Enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"You should have read the fine print."<p>

xx

To be completely honest, she was beginning to hate sunshine.

Though, that might just be because her hatred for water had increased to such an extent, that she needed to come up with a better word than 'hate' or 'loathe' or 'revulsion' or 'abhor.' (She had used all of those at least once at some point.)

Of course, this was all Axel's fault. He was the one who had sent her here. The logical part of her brain told her that this was most likely because she had stabbed him in the gut with her knives, but the emotional (curse that emotional) side of her didn't really care, she was building up a hatred for him almost stronger than her hate of water and sunshine.

He just _had _to send her to a world that was nearly all water. She'd found herself on an island that couldn't really be called forsaken, though she almost wished it was. Because, then, she could have something woeful to complain about.

But no, this island had people on it. There was a nice castle and a little town. The king and queen of the place were very nice and caring and all that wonderful sappy stuff. To make it even better (worse), the happy couple was expecting a child.

Larxene was so thrilled she could puke.

She had been here for probably two weeks now. She had spent just about all of her munny supply on food. She hated having to eat again. Being a Nobody meant going for _months _without having to eat. Most of the time they just ate to make themselves feel an inkling of something. Larxene had been a fan of most sour candies, herself.

Though, now she actually had to worry about food. And aging.

Oh, and the blasted emotions.

However, at the particular moment, the only emotion she was feeling was some variation of hatred or anger.

And she was honestly okay with that.

She crawled (such a lowly word, crawl—yet here she was, doing that exact action) into the little hut that she had made for herself. She was avoiding civilization as much as she could at the moment. They were too happy and asked too many stupid questions. It was like babysitting Roxas all over again. Except, _everyone _was stupid.

And, suddenly, she _cared _about the fact that everyone was stupid. She missed not caring. She decided that having a heart and emotions again topped her list of things she hated. Axel came in a close second. Water was third, sunshine was fourth. And not being able to use any of her powers came fifth.

She pulled her hood up over her face in a pitiful attempt to block out the ever-penetrating sunshine. It didn't really work. She growled and buried her face in her lap. The blackness of the cloak all around seemed to help.

She had been trying since before getting booted here to try to use her lightning and summon dark corridors once more. However, all of those attempts had failed.

Now that she was here, she tried even harder. She at _least _wanted to form a stupid corridor and get _out _of here. Wherever _here _was. This dreadfully, horribly, nastily bright place.

She hated it.

It had been a stupid idea to work with Marluxia. He had botched their chances of getting into Castle Oblivion. He had made her look like a fool in front of Axel and had therefore gotten them both sentenced to who knows where. The one bright side to this, was that she didn't have to deal with his stupid face right now. For Marluxia was somewhere else, thankfully.

She hoped he was hating wherever it was that he was just as much as she was hating this place. It would serve him right, after everything he had put them both through. He hadn't followed through with his plans from the beginning.

As soon as she got off this sunshine world, she would rally a new army and take over that way. Or something like that.

Perhaps she was thinking about this wrong. Perhaps she needed to get revenge on the stupid Keyblade brat. It was, really, all of his fault. Him and that stupid memory witch. What if she were to formulate a plan to seek revenge on Sora, Namine… oh, what the hey, how about that whole little group?

She'd need some help. She couldn't do all the dirty work herself, it allowed too much room for herself to get injured. Maybe she'd find Marluxia again and coax him into helping. Surely she could find a way to make it sound appealing to him.

Of course, first she had to find him. Which probably meant that she had to get off this place first. Which would be a lot easier if she could form dark corridors.

She concentrated for a moment and put her hand out in front of her, trying to form something, _anything_.

Nothing. As usual.

She groaned and flopped back down on the sand. Ah, that was another thing to add to her list of hated things. It would go right at number 6 for the moment.

She decided that, for the moment, she would just sleep. So long as she was here, she might as well just become nocturnal with the amount of annoyance the sun was giving her.

xx

When she woke up again, it was because she was hungry. Being hungry very quickly made it to number 6 on the list, pushing sand down one. She was out of food. It was also dark out, so the chances of any shop being open for business at the moment were very slim. She should have gone and gotten more food before falling asleep. But the stupid sun was just killing her.

This world was slowly killing her. She needed to find a way off, now.

She picked herself up and made her way down to the ocean's edge. She made sure to stay just above the tide. She did hate water, after all.

She could see a broken reflection of herself in the waves. Clear complexion, fierce green eyes, angular features, a permanent sneer. She growled and stomped her boot down into the water to erase the reflection. She didn't want to see it.

"I just want to be anywhere but here," she cried.

"Perhaps I can help with that," came a slippery voice from the ocean.

"Who's there?" she demanded.

The water gurgled and Larxene found herself face-to-face with a very ugly-looking sea-witch. She was green with white hair. She also had tentacles like an octopus. Larxene wasn't grossed out or anything, but she certainly was judging the woman. She particularly was wary of the tone of voice the newcomer was using. She, herself, used that tone many times. More often than not, it was when she was trying to work something to her benefit, not someone else's.

"How are you going to be able to help me?" she spat. "You couldn't even fathom where I came from. Nor where I'm planning on going from here."

"I can't?" the sea-witch asked, placing the tips of her fingers together in a very thoughtful manner.

"No, you can't," Larxene sneered. "So don't even try."

"So you do not want my help?"

"Not unless you can get me to another world; no, I don't want your help."

"Another world?"

"In your dreams, Tentacles."

"I see no need for name-calling!"

"You haven't offered me an alternative, so I'll call you what I want."

"I am Morgana, the rightful queen of this sea. And you are?"

"The Savage Nymph. I shouldn't be here."

"What do you require?"

"The ability to form a dark corridor. Or one of those stupid little teleportation things; Gummi shards? Star blocks?"

"Well, I haven't the slightest clue what those last two are. However, if you are looking for an ability that requires darkness, I think I can give you a bottle of that. I would think that if you drank it, you would be able to do something with its dark powers."

Larxene raised an eyebrow. "And what would you have me do in return? These things always have a catch."

"Smart one, aren't you my dear?"

"Watch who you are calling 'dear'."

Morgana frowned, then decided not to respond to Larxene's last comment. Instead, she decided to answer her question.

"I merely require the trident; it was stolen from me just like my throne."

"Sounds like quite the sob story," Larxene said, sounding completely not amused. "I don't know anything about any trident. What does it do?"

"Only grants the user immeasurable power."

Larxene's ears perked up at the sound of such power. However, upon a second thought of this whole situation, she thought better of jumping in to try and find this trident thing. Even if it might be able to get her off this world, she wasn't sure how much work would go into trying to achieve it. And, if there was going to be a lot of work involved; the best thing to do was to find someone else to do that work for you.

"Look," she said, looking over at Morgana. "How about I give you some magic replenishers, and you give me that bottle of darkness and we call it even."

Morgana perked up at the word 'magic.'

"Magic replenishers?" she asked. "What do they do?"

"Exactly that. They replenish your magic stock. I can't explain it better than that."

She wanted to add more, but she was afraid that she might make them sound significantly less worth it. If she could get away with a couple of ethers in exchange for something that might not actually work, she wouldn't be that bad off. It wasn't like she needed the ethers anyway. It had been so long since she had actually used magic that she honestly couldn't remember how. She had been using merely her own lightning ever since she'd become a Nobody.

Not that she had her own lightning anymore. Stupid Keyblade brat and his stupid screwed up memories wanting to protect the stupid memory witch.

However, since every single Organization cloak came equipped with two ethers and a potion in the pockets, she figured she could spare the two ethers.

"Let's call it a trade," Morgana said, pulling a bottle out from behind her.

It was purple with a skull-shaped stopper. The liquid inside was a bubbling greenish-black color. Larxene dug in her pocket and pulled out the two blue ethers. She started to hand them to the sea witch, but she was halted.

"Not so fast," Morgana said, pulling out a piece of paper and a quill. "All fair trades must be signed by both parties."

Larxene rolled her eyes and snatched the paper and the quill. She barely glanced over the contract before haphazardly signing her name at the bottom. She handed the paper and quill back, which disappeared in a puff of black smoke. Morgana snatched up the ethers, Larxene snatched up the bottle.

Morgana laughed, Larxene raised her eyebrows.

"You should have read the fine print. Your soul now belongs to me."

Larxene rolled her eyes and pocketed the bottle. "Yeah, and that's why I didn't sign my real name. I mean, it is my name, but I haven't used that name in more years than I'd care to count. So, I don't think it really counts. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have other places to be."

She turned away in a huff, leaving Morgana there still trying to figure out a loophole to Larxene's loophole.

Larxene walked a significant amount away before uncorking the bottle and downing it in one gulp. It tasted like something that had already been eaten once and then spat back up. Oh, and fish. She didn't like fish.

However, if it worked, she didn't particularly care.

She put her hand out in front of her and tried to form a dark corridor.

Nothing.

She tried again, but this time she went for lightning.

Still nothing.

Anger flared up inside of her. A deep-seated anger and boiled in her blood. Anger at the arrogant Marluxia whose plan to overthrow the Organization was a miserable failure, anger at the train-wreck of memories Sora, anger at the memory witch with a stupid conscience, anger at Axel—who she couldn't even think up a good enough insult to him at the moment, but one would eventually come to her. Anger at being here, anger at the water, the sunshine, the sand. Anger at the fact that she was angry. Anger at…

She growled. The growl turned into a scream of rage.

Darkness reared up inside of her alongside the anger. But instead of shunning it away like most normal people would do, she embraced it. Darkness was power. She wanted power.

She put her arm out in front of her once more. She channeled the darkness. It trailed out of her fingertips, forming a dark corridor. She smirked.

Perhaps the little bottle of nastiness took a bit of time to work. Or, perhaps she had managed this all on her own. She would like to think that it was the second one. She liked the idea of doing this on her own power.

She tried once more to form a bolt of lightning, but nothing came.

"In time," she told herself. "In due time."

She waltzed through the dark corridor and it closed behind her. She had some revenge to concoct. But first she'd need to find Marluxia, and maybe some Dusks that would still listen to her.

The Keyblade Wielder and all of his friends were in for such a world of hurt. They would regret making her feel this pain. She would utilize this new anger and hatred to further fuel her revenge.

She needed a fortress. Someplace where she could work silently behind the scenes while her minions did the rest of the work. If she did this right, Sora would come to her.

And then he would pay.


	27. WINNER

**Author's Note: **Hi everybody! This happens directly after what occurred in Can't Escape. It's not entirely necessary to read the two chapters (the last two posted as of now) for this to make sense, however, to get a more complete picture of what went on, those chapters might be helpful. Other than that, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"Way to be a killjoy."<p>

xx

Axel, Roxas and Xion stood in line at the ice cream shop. Xion and Roxas had convinced Axel to _not _wear his cloak on this occasion, though he had grown rather accustomed to wearing over the past week or so as he had been searching for traces of Kuin and then Kuin herself.

"So, tell me why we're making a special trip just for ice cream?" Roxas asked. "It's not like we even got back from a long day of work."

Axel pulled three WINNER sticks out of his pockets. "I figured it's time to redeem these."

"How'd you get so many?" Xion asked.

Axel snorted. "This isn't a lot. Joseph has _loads_. But, Roxas gave me this one." He held up one stick. "I got this one on my own." He held up a second stick. "And, speaking of Joseph, he gave me this one. Three sticks, three of us. I figured now's a good a time as any."

"Any particular reason why we're doing this now?" Roxas asked. "Not that I'm complaining."

"Well, Joseph reminded me when I saw him yesterday."

"You saw Joseph yesterday?" Roxas asked.

"Yeah, I'll tell you the whole story once we've all got ice cream."

Roxas and Xion exchanged excited glances.

They got up to the front of the line and Axel placed the three WINNER sticks on the counter. He smiled at the lady.

"Three sea-salts please," he said.

"Three WINNER sticks?" the lady replied, smiling. "How did you get so lucky?"

"I'm not, not really. I've just been saving them. I wanted to have ice cream with my friends." He gestured to Roxas and Xion standing behind him.

The lady smiled. "That's the best way to do it, dearie."

She went around to the freezer and pulled out three sea salt ice creams. She put them in a bag and handed them to Axel.

"There you go," she said, smiling.

Axel took the bag, grinned at Roxas and Xion and the three of them made their way out to Station Plaza.

xx

As soon as they were all situated on the Clocktower happily munching on their ice cream, Xion looked around Roxas at Axel and asked:

"So, you saw Joseph yesterday?"

Axel took a giant bite of his ice cream and nodded. "Yup. Star shard decided it would be an excellent time to take me to that other universe."

"How'd you know?"

"Because I was in The World that Never Was, and there were Larxene replicas."

"I am oddly glad that Vexen never replicated anyone else besides himself," Roxas said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, they were quite evil and annoying. Though, there was one who was with a Marluxia replica… it was interesting."

"With?" Xion asked. "Like, _dating, _with?"

Axel nodded.

She blinked, unsure what to make of that.

"Yeah, that was my reaction to. I did run into myself though. _That _was fun."

"What'd you do?"

"Oh, we caused some trouble, talked about life and the meaning of the universe, and freaked someone out 'cause he saw double, nothing too terribly special."

"And you ran into Joseph," Roxas said.

"Well, rather, Joseph ran into us. Quite literally the second time."

"How is Joseph?" Roxas asked. "I mean, I've never actually met the kid, but, he seems nice."

"Oh, I think he's doing just fine," Axel replied, taking another bite of his ice cream. "He was collecting more of his hundreds of WINNER sticks—which is what made me think of this—and I left him just as he was taking down the chandelier in the Grey Area."

"The giant chandelier?" Xion asked, her eyes going wide.

Axel nodded.

"Why was he doing that?" Roxas asked.

"Well, he was supposed to be creating a distraction. To my understanding, they were trying to lock Saix out of the Replica Program so he'd stop rewriting replicas left and right."

Xion winced. There really wasn't much surprise about that.

"Sounds like things are very exciting over there," Roxas mused.

"Exciting?" Axel asked, finishing his ice cream. "Doesn't sound like the type of thing you'd call exciting."

Roxas shrugged. "Maybe that wasn't the right word. I was just pointing out that it sounds like they've got a lot going on over there. It's rather quiet here."

"We just dealt with a Nobody problem in Traverse Town yesterday," Xion said, attempting to save a dripping portion of her ice cream. She succeeded, but only barely.

"Well, yeah," Roxas said. "But that's nothing compared to what's going on over there."

"I'd rather be here than there," Xion said. "_You _don't have to worry about rewrites!"

"Technically," Roxas said. "I've got more data in me than Namine. And she's already gone in for a small rewrite once." He shrugged.

"You're just more comfortable with yourself," Axel said, gesturing to Roxas with his now-empty ice cream stick.

"Namine went in to give herself a fighting ability," Xion said. "That hardly counts. You have a Keyblade, Roxas, and you always have."

"That's true," Roxas allowed.

"I suppose she could have just learned to fight though," Axel said. "Like the rest of us."

Xion shifted.

"Well, aside from you, I suppose," Axel amended.

"You could argue that she didn't really have time though," Xion said. "Xehanort was basically right on Castle Oblivion's doorstep."

"We didn't know at that time when he was coming. We just knew that he was."

"Hey, I'm glad she went and did that," Roxas said. "It helped save us quite a few times in that battle."

"Everyone played their part," Xion said.

Axel had grown quiet.

"Everything all right?" Roxas asked.

Axel shook his head to clear it. "Yeah, I was just thinking about that battle, that's all."

"Does this have something to do with Saix?" Xion asked.

Axel frowned.

"I can't help but wonder if maybe I had tried to save him from that darkness," Axel said quietly. "If maybe I could have rescued him."

"Well," Roxas said. "Assuming you could have rescued him; didn't he say to just let him go?"

Axel nodded.

"I think he would have resented you," Roxas continued, much more quietly.

Axel looked over at him. "Really?"

Roxas nodded.

"I think Saix was done living the life he had chosen to live," Xion said, licking away the last of her ice cream. "I also think he was done with second chances."

"How do you figure?" Axel asked.

"Well, when I think about if I was in Saix's place," Roxas said. "If I had been drowning in darkness and was ready to be done with my existence. If someone rescued me against my will, I think I would resent them for a bit."

"I think he'd get over it eventually," Xion added. "But still, I think you and Saix had enough crud going on between you to add anything else."

"You know, for two people who don't come across as knowing much, you can sure say insightful things sometimes," Axel muttered.

"What's that supposed to mean?" the other two argued simultaneously.

Axel laughed. "I suppose I should really stop brooding about his death, shouldn't I?"

Xion and Roxas thought for a minute.

"Well, I think it's appropriate to mourn the loss of a friend," Xion said, after a bit. "But I certainly would say that brooding's a bad idea."

Roxas didn't have anything to add, he just nodded in agreement.

"I was thinking about this earlier," Axel said. "And I figured that I should probably be grateful. The Axel and Saix in the other universe seem to have things worse off. But, who am I to judge?"

Roxas was staring down at his melting ice cream, but he wasn't doing anything to fix it.

"Axel, I have to ask," he said. "Where are me and Xion in the other universe? I vaguely remember Joseph saying something about us being replicas, and I think I remember him saying that we weren't around anymore—but I can't remember."

"Saix destroyed Roxas," Axel said grimly. "Something about him being a mistake in his eyes. I can only assume Xion met a similar end. I didn't ask."

Xion frowned. "Aw, gee, thanks," she said, pushing Axel.

He pushed back playfully.

"Saix really doesn't like replicas, does he?" Roxas asked.

"Oh, lighten up," Xion said, before Axel had a chance to respond. "If I'm not allowed to freak out because I'm a replica, _you _sure aren't!"

"I'm not freaking out because you're a replica!" Roxas argued.

"Good!" Xion said. "Because I think that would be a serious detriment to our relationship!"

"Oh geez," Axel said, kneading his forehead. "Can I _not _be a third wheel right now? You two promised."

"We weren't doing anything!" Xion said. "I just mentioned the fact that we were…"

Roxas put a hand on hers. "Let it go."

"Roxas," Xion said. "Your ice cream is dripping."

"It's been dripping," Axel pointed out.

Roxas decided that he might as well do something about his melting ice cream then.

"I don't get it," Xion said, giggling. "Can you not talk and eat ice cream at the same time?"

Roxas frowned at her through a mouthful of ice cream.

"Apparently not," Axel said, laughing more.

Roxas shoved Xion into Axel. Axel shoved both of them back. They all laughed.

"Just like old times, wouldn't you say?" Axel said, looking off into the horizon.

The remainder of Roxas' ice cream dripped down to the ground far below.

"Just like old times," Roxas said, a bit forlorn.

"If I got better at controlling dark corridors," Xion said, looking down at the falling ice cream. "I suppose I could form one under the ice cream and have it fall back to you. Though, you'd have to be good at catching it."

"Vertical corridors are a pain," Axel warned her. "Besides, I'd prefer it if you didn't go there. It's kinda showing off."

"You guys show off all the time!" Xion argued. "And you're just jealous because I can form a dark corridor without it being detrimental to my heart because it's in my data."

Axel rolled his eyes.

"Hey Xion," he said after a moment. "Do you know why the sun sets red?"

Roxas rolled his eyes now, having a pretty good idea about what was coming.

Xion was still thinking about the question when Axel started to answer:

"You see, light is made up of lots of colors. And out of all those colors—red is the one that travels the farthest."

Xion rolled her eyes. "Sheesh, Axel, so not only are you a show-off, but you're a know-it-all too!"

Roxas laughed. Axel pretended to be offended for a minute, but then he laughed as well. Soon, all three of them were cracking up.

"I'm glad that we're still friends," Xion said after the laughter had died down. "And that we can come up here and talk and eat ice cream, without having to worry about the Organization tearing us apart."

"Yeah," Roxas agreed.

"Hate to burst your bubble," Axel said. "But there are other things besides the Organization that will try to tear us apart."

"Way to be a kill joy," Xion muttered.

"Yeah," Roxas said. "But I think we can take on anything."

Xion nodded, grinning.

"I'll give you that," Axel muttered. "You two are quite determined."

"You're determined, too," Roxas pointed out. "Who's currently on hunt for a girl that you barely even know because you sort of find her attractive?"

Axel glared at him.

"Wait, now, what?" Xion asked.

Axel's glare deepened.

Roxas laughed sheepishly. "So, that whole thing with the light corridors…"

"It's about a _girl_?" Xion asked.

Axel groaned. However, he wasn't really as upset as he made it seem.


	28. A Day in Agrabah

**Author's Note: **Okay, I legitimately think I'm getting into the swing of things here to post semi-regularly. Maybe. I don't actually know. Maybe I just have more free time at the moment. (I had a burst of homework last week.) Though, my birthday's coming up the weekend after next. Oh, by the way, rar's birthday is the seventh. So you should all wish her a happy birthday then. I don't think anything else is coming up before I should have another chapter posted... so, no more news at the moment.

For those of you paying attention to the timeline, this happens at the same time as the Dance sequence posted in Plan Beta. I'm also running a tad behind rar... but I'm hoping to catch up. If I'm lucky, I'll even have another chapter up by tomorrow. :)

* * *

><p>"I am saying one thing: this is not a date."<p>

xx

Kuin sat on the wall that surrounded the city of Agrabah. She sat facing the city, which was the way that the sun wasn't facing. She didn't want to be staring into the sun. She had just wanted somewhere remote to sit and _think_. She was completely peeved at Marluxia. She was slightly miffed at Axel, but only slightly. She had come to the conclusion that she needed to figure out what side he was on _now_. It didn't really matter what side he had been on a year or two ago—people change. What mattered was the side he was fighting for _now_. That was all.

Of course, that would involve seeing him again. But she wasn't about to go looking for him. He could find her again. He'd already done so once before. She wouldn't put it past him to do it again. Even if his method of shooting darts on a dartboard was a tad unconventional.

She was royally confused about all the Keyblade Wielders that he associated himself with. Sora and Roxas—a Somebody and a Nobody of the same person who existed simultaneously. Then there was Xion—the imperfect Replica of Roxas who also Wielded. She had been destroyed and rebuilt. Then there was Ven who was also connected to Sora.

Namine was the Nobody of Kairi—and both of them had existed simultaneously. Kairi Wielded, Namine did not. But Namine could do things with memories that Kuin could only begin to fathom.

Then there was Riku, who bore an uncanny resemblance to _him_. But he fought against the darkness, so she really didn't have anything against him.

Then there was the ridiculous can of worms that was Axel.

And _somehow _everyone related back to the Sora kid. What was so special about him? Was it because he at one point contained so many people inside of his heart? Was it because he Wielded without any form of Inheritance besides one of association? Kuin doubted the kid himself knew why he was special. It wasn't really her business anyway.

However, now that there were Wielders on the playing field again, it meant that her job would have to adjust. Yes, she was the last one with her job description—but she now had people to help her fight for the balance. Therefore, she should _probably _work in tandem with them. It wouldn't be too hard, not if she used Axel as a leeway.

But then it became an issue of pride.

She pounded her fist on the wall in frustration. Men.

She spotted some stupid Dusks appear down on the ground. Nasty things. They had no clue what to do with themselves with no one commanding them. They just flitted from world to world, looking for hearts to fill the void that they felt. She pulled out her gun and shot each and every one of them. They disappeared in little puffs of darkness and she smiled in satisfaction.

She heard a star shard appear to the right of her and she aimed her gun in that general direction without looking away from the spot on the ground she was staring at. She had a feeling she knew who it was.

"Sheesh louise!" Axel said, holding up his hands in front of him in a pitiful defensive gesture. Like holding his hands out in front of his chest was going to protect him from her_gun_.

"It's just me," he continued.

"I figured as much," she replied coolly, lowering her gun; though she still didn't look over. "You seem to have found me again. So easily? And you arrive on the wall where I am?"

"Lucky guess," Axel said, scratching the back of his neck nervously. He turned around and promptly dropped to a sitting position next to Kuin. She couldn't tell if he had meant to do that or if he had fallen. Pity, if he had fallen, she could laugh at him.

"I have a hard time believing that you would _guess _to show up on a wall to a city when there is a high chance that you'd fall off."

"Well, we're in a rather obscure part of the city. Perhaps I'm just showing up here because I know no one's going to notice."

She raised an eyebrow.

"You don't count. You know there's other worlds."

"So, did you come here to find me, or is there any other particular reason why you're sitting next to me on a wall in Agrabah?"

"Considering generally when I'm sitting on a wall, I'm sitting on a wall in Twilight Town, I suppose I'll have to admit to the first one."

"Why do you keep wanting to find me?"

"You said I couldn't keep up."

She snorted. "Honorable enough."

The two of them sat in silence for a bit. Axel turned around to stare at the sun which was still high in the sky, though it was certainly after midday.

"Is there any particular reason why _you're _sitting on a wall in Agrabah?" he asked.

"Wanted to find a quiet place to think."

"You picked a hot one."

"Says the man who plays with fire." Kuin rolled her eyes.

"Touché. What are you thinking about? Or does that go on the list of things that you won't tell me?"

"I ran into Marluxia."

"That came out of completely nowhere," Axel snorted. "You ran into _Marluxia? _Pink hair, pretentious, lying, git?"

"Well, he certainly had pink hair and was pretentious. I don't actually think he lied to me, but he certainly mumbled enough to obscure the truth."

"Marluxia mumbling. That's new." Axel shifted so his elbows were resting on his knees as he stared off into the city. "When and where did you run into him?"

"Land of Dragons. I want to say that _you _sent him there."

It was the first time that she looked directly at him.

Axel scratched his head, thinking. "I _did _send him there, didn't I? He was being bothersome in Castle Oblivion. I sent him to Land of Dragons and Larxene to Atlantica."

Kuin frowned. She had missed those video feeds.

"Do you have a problem with that?"

She shook her head, not wanting to explain _why _she was frowning. "Define bothersome."

"Oh, him and Larxene wanted in. We, as in me and my friends, were in the middle of something. They wouldn't tell me what side they were on. Then she stabbed me. I sent them places that would annoy them."

"What side did you want them to be on?"

"Not Xehanort's. Not their own. I mean, I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting. They really only ever looked out for themselves in their days in the Organization… Aw, nuts, I was hoping to avoid crap from my past."

"Hmm?"

"Nothing. You're just going to want to kill me, that's all."

"I know."

"What? You know that you want to kill me?"

"No, I know you were in the Organization. I also know that you betrayed them. I've come to the conclusion that I don't have to kill you. Well, not yet at least."

"What does that supposed to mean?"

"Depends on what side you're on."

"Now that one's a hard to answer."

She raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to continue, but he didn't. Instead, he went and changed the subject. She should have prompted him when he had the chance.

"So, what did you do to old Marly?"

"Unfortunately, he got me to send him to Traverse Town. He's probably gotten himself a star shard by now."

"He has," Axel grumbled. "Ran into him a few days ago. Granted, we left without attacking each other, but he's free to roam. I can only hope that Larxene's still where I sent her… nasty little…"

"She's the blonde one, with the lightning?"

"How do you know?" Axel asked. "Come to think of it, you knew I was in the Organization too."

"I was in Castle Oblivion. I confess I was doing some research on you."

"Huh. Well, then at least you know who Marluxia and Larxene are. Let me know if you run into them again, okay? I'd like to know what they're up to. Considering they're_probably _out for revenge. Either on me or on one of my friends."

"So, are you saying they're the bad guys?"

Axel shrugged. "That's assuming I'm the good guy."

"Do you think you're the good guy?"

"Define good."

She frowned.

"You saw the tapes at Castle Oblivion. What do you think?"

"I think you were following orders."

He laughed. "Good answer."

"What do you suppose you're doing now, though? If you're not following orders."

Axel sighed. "I suppose I'm taking the advice that Roxas gave me—follow my heart."

Kuin raised her eyebrows.

"I must confess," he said. "It's led me to some pretty interesting places. Including a world that I had never been to before."

She tilted her head towards him, indicating that he had better continue.

Axel reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He made to hand it to her. She frowned at it. It was old and a tad crumpled, but she could see now that it was a photograph. A corner of it was torn. She took it gingerly out of his hands and unfolded it. She gasped.

She had not seen likenesses of two of the people in the photograph in years. She had purposely been avoiding their files. The third person in the photograph…

Well, she had seen a likeness of her the last time she had looked in a mirror. Though, there was certainly an age difference.

"Where did you find this?"

"I think you know."

"You went poking around my home…"

He nodded, neither apologetic or proud. "I was curious."

She let out a very long sigh. "I can't say much. I did the same thing. Though I didn't gopoking around _your _home."

"It doesn't look the same," Axel said with a grim laugh. "Being plunged into darkness a couple of times certainly doesn't help that."

"And my home looks like it did when I was growing up?" Kuin asked, upset. She was more upset that her voice cracked though.

Axel looked down at his feet. "Point taken."

Kuin ran her fingers over the picture. Axel didn't look at her.

"Xehanort's gone, at least."

"So you said. Though it was indirectly. How'd he go?"

"Eight Keyblades full of light."

"That would do it."

"It sure did. Watched him go myself."

"Almost wish I was there. Wish I was the one to put a light bullet through his head."

"They make light bullets?"

"They're expensive. But they exist."

"I'm sorry for what he did."

"I don't want your pity."

"Is there anything in particular that you do want?"

She didn't have an answer for him.

"Is there anyone you'd like me to kill for you?"

She snorted. "I can take care of them myself."

"Just thought I'd offer. Though, generally speaking, I don't like icky jobs."

"I've noticed."

He raised an eyebrow.

"I've been through a lot of video feeds on Castle Oblivion, and a lot of the database."

"Just to clarify, you don't want to kill me?"

"Well, I feel no obligation to. Not unless I see you doing something that is seriously disrupting the balance of the worlds. However, it would appear to me that you're fighting for the balance in your own way."

Axel snorted and rolled his eyes. "Whatever, so long as I'm not slated to die anytime soon."

"You have a high sense of self preservation."

"Bingo."

"Which begs the question, why do you keep coming to see me when you _knew _there was a chance I might be obligated to kill you?"

Axel laughed and stood up. "I think I shall save that answer for another day. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to go get some ice cream. All this sitting on walls is making me miss it. You're welcome to join me if you want. Otherwise, you can continue to sit here and think."

Kuin looked up at him, an intrigued expression on her face.

"You know what," she said. "I think I will join you."

Axel offered out a hand to help her up.

"That's the spirit. I find that a nice sea salt ice cream can always brighten your spirits."

"Whatever. But I am saying one thing: this is not a date."

Axel pretended to look offended. Kuin didn't care.


	29. Just an Itty Bit too Much

**Author's Note: **so... after fanfic's deleted this author's note six times... I'm not all that happy about it. however, here's the next chapter, do enjoy, despite my wanting to shoot something...

* * *

><p>"May I ask why you want to know? I doubt this has anything to do with a friendly get-together."<p>

xx

Axel was not particularly surprised to find everyone else on the smaller island over by the Paopu tree. He was, however, surprised to find a giant map spread in between them and them all laying things out as if they were planning out a battle stratagem or something.

"Yo," he said, walking up.

"Hello Axel," Xion replied, not looking up from the map.

"Okay, before I ask about the gigantic map, how did the dance go?"

"You missed an epic battle," Roxas said, the first to look up. "Sephiroth showed up and he and Cloud knocked down two whole light fixtures before we got rid of him."

"Oh, great, just when I think I can forgo something because it's not going to be interesting, Sephiroth shows up and makes a scene."

"Basically," Namine said.

"Did you run into Kuin?" Xion asked.

Axel glared at her.

"Who?" Sora asked, looking up with a very confused expression on her face.

"Oh is she the girl with the purple hair?" Namine asked, sitting back on her heels.

"Of course you've drawn me with her," Axel said.

"She looked like she enjoyed the ice cream," Namine mused. Then her eyes went wide and she covered her mouth as if she could just pick the words back up and eat them. "Oh_please _tell me that's happened already! I sometimes can't tell if it has or not, especially when I'm not around to gauge…"

"It's happened," Axel said. "We went last night. And, I suppose you could say she _did _enjoy it."

"I'm confused," Sora said.

"From the sounds of things," Kairi said with a giggle. "Axel's got a girlfriend."

"She's not my girlfriend," Axel said adamantly. "She even said it wasn't a date."

Nearly everyone there burst out laughing. Except Riku; though he leaned forward to let his bangs cover his smirk.

"So the giant map," Axel said in an effort to change the subject.

"We're trying to decide the best course of action," Riku said. "Because we're needed in two places at once."

"There's six of you, how can that be a problem?"

"Well, the jobs that are laid out for us will probably require at least three people in each party," Kairi said. "So we're trying to figure out how to best split us up."

"What are the jobs?" Axel asked.

"Well, first off," Namine said. "34 called. He says there's a cloaked figure lurking around Castle Oblivion causing havoc. Unfortunately, none of the Vexen Replicas there can figure out _who _the person is."

"Nor can they catch up to whoever it is," Xion added. "So he's asked for a few of us to go there and try and figure it out."

"I should probably go," Namine said. "Since I have the best chance of figuring out who it is. But even I won't be of much help if it's someone none of us have ever met."

"Which is highly likely," Roxas said.

"Not necessarily," Riku argued. "Generally speaking, if you're sneaking around Castle Oblivion, you know it's there. And enough of us have been there…"

"Regardless," Roxas said. "At least three of us should go there."

"What's the other job?"

"Elizabeth from Port Royal has been captured," Kairi said.

"Doesn't sound like something we have to go fix."

"Except it's not just that," Sora said. "Cid got his darkness tracker fully up and functional. According to him, Port Royal's had an… oh what was the word…"

"Influx," Riku said.

"Yeah, one of those, of darkness. And the best people to go deal with that would be a few Keyblade Wielders; no offense, Namine…"

"None taken," she said.

"Aren't Ven, Terra and Aqua out in the worlds dealing with fluctuating darkness and Keyholes?" Axel asked.

"Well, no one can contact them," Xion said. "Cid sent us two phones with Tifa last night. The others don't have one at all."

"You can just star shard yourself to wherever it is they are," Axel pointed out.

"Not even going to comment on how 'star shard' is not a verb," Roxas said.

"That's possible?" Sora asked.

Axel nodded. "I've done it myself several times."

"It'd take too long," Riku said. "Especially if they're already in the middle of something. We've wasted enough time already. Three of us need to be heading to Castle Oblivion now and the other three of us need to be heading to Port Royal five minutes ago. Unless Axel's willing to lend a hand?"

Axel yawned. "To be completely honest, I haven't slept in a few days…"

"So you pick _now _to sleep?" Roxas asked.

"Thought that might be the case," Riku muttered.

"That still doesn't explain the map."

"We like pointing at things while we're deciding," Sora said.

"Even though Namine had to draw in Castle Oblivion," Kairi added.

Riku glared at them. "Wasting. Time."

"We could just draw straws," Sora suggested.

"Sora, _how _is that helpful? That's only helpful if we're trying to find _one _person to do a job that no one wants to do. Or the order in which we should do something."

"We could draw pencils," Namine said.

Everyone looked at her with completely flabbergasted expressions. Riku looked like he was still trying to talk but no sound was coming out. Axel had to figure that it was because he didn't want to be arguing with Namine, but he had to somehow tell her that her idea wasn't going to help much either.

"No, see, I can pick out a color for each of us and then one of us could organize them into two groups."

"We'd have to do it blindly," Roxas said. "Otherwise it won't help us at all."

"Axel could do it," Kairi suggested.

"Don't make me decide who should go in what group!"

"We could blindfold him," Sora suggested.

Everyone looked at Riku.

"Like I carry a blindfold with me!"

"I carry bandages," Namine said, digging into her bag.

"Why?" Axel asked.

"For obvious reasons," Namine said. "None of us have the greatest track records for remaining injury-free in battle. Kairi carries them around too."

"Fine," Axel said. "Blindfold me. But those better be unused bandages."

Namine pulled out a strip of cloth and handed it to Axel. He swiped it out of her hands and tied it around his eyes. Namine handed him six pencils.

"How do we know who's who?" Xion asked.

"I know," Namine said.

"Cheater," Sora teased.

Axel rolled his eyes, though no one could see. He rolled the pencils around in his hands for a bit before separating three into one hand and three into the other. He put them down on the ground for everyone to see and took the blindfold off.

Namine winced. She pointed to one group of pencils. "Sora, Kairi and myself." She pointed to the other group. "Riku, Roxas and Xion."

"No, no," Sora said. "What are the real groups? You just said that in an attempt to prove you weren't cheating."

Namine shook her head. "I'm the white pencil. Riku's the blue one. Kairi's pink, Sora's red, Roxas is gold and Xion is purple."

No one, not even Riku, argued with her.

"Well, I guess that settles that, then," Roxas said.

"I can shuffle them again," Axel suggested.

"To similar results," Namine said. "It's fine the way it is. Sora, Kairi and I will go to Castle Oblivion. Riku, Roxas and Xion can go to Port Royal. If all goes well, we'll all be done by evening."

Riku stood up. "We should get going," he said, gruffly. He looked to Sora. "Take care of her!"

"Riku, I can take care of myself," Namine insisted.

"Yes, but if you get hurt, it's his fault."

Sora shrugged, not even bothering to argue.

Riku turned to Roxas and Xion. "Get ready for some Keyblade training, because that's what I'm going to be using this as."

Roxas and Xion nodded.

"Does everyone have everything?" Kairi asked as Namine gathered up her pencils.

Everyone nodded, though both Sora and Roxas joked about needing another potion or ether. Something only the two of them actually found amusing.

In the flash of two star shards, they were all gone, leaving Axel kneeling there with a strip of bandages and a giant map. He sighed and rolled it up, thinking of no other thing to do with it. He'd take it back to his room and give it to whoever he saw first.

It was time for that nap he had started thinking about five minutes ago.

xx

Elizabeth had decided that this time around, she wasn't going to struggle against the ropes that bound her to the chair. She had been in so many random predicaments over the past year or so that she was almost used to this sort of thing. Rather, she was directing most of her energy to glaring at her captor, who had yet to show his face, and working on gathering enough saliva to get good one spit at him as soon as he leered in close enough to her. The rest of her mind power was thinking about possible routes of escape if Will took too long.

And she wouldn't blame him if he did. Take too long, that is.

Her captor wore the same black cloak that the one man who had been working with Davy Jones all those months ago. However, her gut told her he wasn't the same man. That man had disappeared into a corridor of darkness and had very quickly been followed by Sora—who looked angry enough to kill. Elizabeth would bet that that man wasn't around anymore.

Her current captor was a quiet one, which bothered her. She liked giving witty comebacks. But she couldn't give a witty comeback if he didn't say anything first.

At long last, he turned to face her. He still didn't say anything though.

Elizabeth sighed. "Well, get on with it then. At this rate, you won't get anything accomplished before Will shows up."

"I thought Jack was your man," he said, speaking at last.

"If this has anything to do with the sinking ship and the kraken, that's _not _what it looked like! I swear to you!"

She got the feeling that he was making an amused expression, but she couldn't be too sure. The whole hood-over-the-face thing was certainly disarming.

"Well, whatever then. Regardless of who your man is, tell me what I'd like to know."

"Yeah, that'd be great, if you'd tell me what that is!"

"Where's Sora?"

Elizabeth laughed. "It's been _months _since I've seen him! I have no clue!"

"I've sampled your memories, miss. I know you've seen him."

"Yes, _months _ago. So, if that's all you want, can I go now? Maybe I can surprise my rescue party."

"Hmm, perhaps that power weakened with the new Somebody status."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes. She hated when the otherworldly people talked about things she didn't understand. She had thought to ask the one girl—Kairi—about it, but she hadn't gotten the chance in the midst of making the crew of that ship believe there was a ghost on board.

Her captor was still muttering. Unfortunately, it wasn't the crazy muttering, or frazzled muttering. It was a plotting mumbling. This probably didn't bode very well for her.

"Look," she said, making an attempt to get out of the ropes—mostly just for show though. "If that's all you wanted from me, can you _please _just let me go? I have other things to be doing at the moment."

Though, it wasn't like she was in a _horribly _big hurry to rescue Jack from Davy Jones' Locker. But, it needed to be done.

"Do you know the whereabouts of _any _of Sora's friends, then?"

"Haven't seen them since I saw him," Elizabeth replied. "May I ask why you want to know? I doubt this has anything to do with a friendly get-together."

"Revenge, my sweet," her captor replied.

Elizabeth made a gagging noise. Mostly because he had just called her 'my sweet.' Not that someone getting revenge on Sora meant anything good. However, looking at the man, she had to wonder if he knew what he was doing entirely. He seemed like he knew what he was doing, but at the mention of revenge against Sora… she questioned his sanity a little.

Elizabeth made a big show of sighing. He hadn't responded to her struggling, so she'd just go back to being bored. She wondered how long it was going to take the search party to show up. Even if Will wasn't very happy with her at the moment, Barbossa was under the impression that they'd need _everyone _possible to find Jack.


	30. Disquieting

**Author's Note: **Erm... Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"I am tired of you talking. Very, <em>very, <em>tired of it."

xx

Sora, Kairi and Namine walked into the entrance hall of Castle Oblivion. Their footsteps echoed very loudly on the marble floor.

"Is it always this quiet?" Kairi asked, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear.

"Well, it usually is," Namine said. "However, lately we've usually been interrupted by a Vexen Replica by now."

More echoing footsteps caught their attention. However, these footsteps didn't belong to someone who was just walking; this person was running.

The three of them turned to see a figure wearing the classical black cloak with the hood pulled up. The person did a double-take when they saw them. Then, whoever they were, they ran straight to the floor transport crystal, stuck their hand on it and disappeared.

"Lovely," Namine mused.

"Any clue as to who it is?" Kairi asked.

"Didn't have enough time to properly search," Namine said, shaking her head. "It was a little bit of an explosion of memories at the top, anyway. Though, I think it's safe to say that whoever _that _was, they recognized us."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" Sora asked.

"Oh, probably bad," Namine said.

"You're so optimistic," Kairi muttered.

Namine walked over to the floor transport.

"Can we follow them?" Sora asked.

Namine shook her head. "There's a couple dozen floors that they could be on and it would take too long to check them all. I'm thinking we should just head to where the Vexen Replicas are, since they're not coming to us. Besides, they've got cameras."

"So, what do we do then?" Sora asked.

"We watch the person and try and figure out where they're going to go next or if there is a method to their lurking. We can try to head them off, then and get the upper hand."

"Sounds like a plan, let's do that!" Sora said.

"Kairi?" Namine asked.

She shrugged. "Whatever's good."

"Well, you're included in this," Namine said.

"Usually, Sora and Riku made the decisions and I just followed along."

Namine rolled her eyes. "Of course. Well, here, it's all three of us making the decisions." She looked pointedly at Sora.

He gestured to her and Kairi. "Whatever the ladies want."

Kairi and Namine giggled and Namine put her hand on the crystal.

"You guys too."

Kairi and Sora followed suit and the three of them were transported to a different level.

Namine started walking very pointedly in the direction of…somewhere.

"How do you keep this place straight in your head, Namine?" Sora asked. "It all looks the same."

"I lived here for a bit, you forget," Namine reminded him. "Besides, you knew this place very well yourself, in a life you don't remember. However, even then, it looked different when it was molded after your memories."

Sora merely shrugged and continued walking.

Namine walked directly up to a door and tried the handle. It was locked. She frowned.

"That's odd, this door has never been locked," she mused.

"Kairi, do you want to do the honors?" Sora asked.

Kairi pulled out her Keyblade and unlocked the door. Namine turned the handle and they walked in.

They were faced with three Vexen Replicas that looked rather paranoid.

"Really?" Namine asked. "You didn't know it was us?"

"We've been watching _that _person!" 34 said, looking a tad flabbergasted.

"Well, that's what we're here to do," Sora said. "And then maybe we can head them off at some point and solve whatever is going on around here."

42 gestured to the cameras in a 'have-at-it' gesture. 27 was nice enough to point out where the mysterious figure was.

"They don't seem to be doing anything really," Kairi mused after a few moments of watching. "They're just… running around."

"What floor is this on?" Sora asked.

"Basement 7," 34 replied. "Though what they're doing _there _is anyone's guess. Nothing important is there."

"Perhaps they don't know where the important things are?" Kairi suggested.

"Or they're trying to confuse the people watching," 27 suggested.

"Well, from the looks of things, they're not too far from the transport crystal. If we make a sprint for the one up here and head down there, we might be able to beat them," Namine said.

"You are forgetting the part where you can't transport from floor to basement without stopping on the ground floor first, Miss Namine," 42 said. "You'd waste precious time."

"Well that is inconvenient," Namine muttered.

"Well, after getting to the ground floor, we could split up to different levels," Kairi suggested.

"No!" Sora and Namine both said, very loudly.

"Okay, I get why _I _said no," Namine said, raising an eyebrow. "Because I know the dangers of Castle Oblivion. Sora, why did _you _say no so quickly?"

"Well," Sora replied, flushing. "I don't particularly want to be separated from Kai—either of you two, really. Besides, if Riku found out, he'd never let me forget it."

"It was just a suggestion," Kairi mumbled.

"And a very good one," Sora said. "But, given the circumstances, not our best option."

"Are you opposed to using dark corridors?" 34 asked.

"Well… if you could get us right there…" Namine said. "I mean, a short trip like this wouldn't be _too _detrimental. Sora? You're the one who's probably most at risk."

"I think I'm fine," Sora said.

"Then, that would be nice, actually," Kairi said.

34 casually reached behind him and formed a dark corridor for the three of them to walk through.

"Let us know your findings," he said.

"You'll be watching anyway," Sora pointed out. "But if you insist, we'll come back and let you know."

The three of them went through the dark corridor.

They appeared right behind the mysterious figure. However, as soon as the sound of the dark corridor disappearing caught said figure's attention; they spun around.

"Cheaters," she spat, for it was obviously a girl's voice. "Which one of you can form them?"

"It wasn't any of us," Kairi said. "We just had a little bit of outside help."

They got the impression that she turned up her nose at them. They couldn't tell since her hood was up.

"Would you mind telling us who you are, while we've got your attention?" Sora asked.

"You mean to tell me that you don't remember?" she replied, her voice patronizing. Then she laughed—a laugh that could both chill blood and break windows at the same time. "Namine here remembers, don't you Memory Witch?"

Kairi gasped at those words. She expected Namine to gasp too, but when she turned to look at her, Namine was hunched over, looking at her feet—as if the mysterious woman had some unseen power over her. She was trembling.

_Namine! _Kairi shrieked. _What is going on?_

"That's Larxene…" Namine mumbled, too quiet for anyone but Kairi to hear.

_I take it you know her. And, Sora probably knew her too at… oh!_

_You remember then._

Kairi nodded, her face paling.

"Would you two quit doing your telepathic thing and get me in on the loop," Sora said.

"Telepathic thing," Larxene said. "Well, that's new. Any more surprises for me, Memory Witch?"

Namine cringed at the words.

"Oh, and tell me how it is standing next to the girl who's shadow you've _always _been in as well as the boy you were always just _dying _to meet…"

"Sora," Kairi said, interrupting Larxene before she could go any further. "This is Larxene, you fought her here in Castle Oblivion, however you don't remember that part."

"Would you say we need to fight her again?"

Kairi looked between Larxene and Namine. Namine hadn't moved out of her cringe. Larxene, even with the hood up, looked like she was sneering.

"Are you just not going to respond?" Larxene asked, directing her words rather pointedly at Namine. She had obviously ignored the part where Kairi had introduced them and Sora had asked if they would need to fight.

_Namine! _Kairi said. _You're better than this!_

_But… it's Larxene… you don't even _want _to know the _beginning _of the things that she's done…_

_Well, you can't just stand here and let her torment you. And even if that's what _you _plan on doing, _I _sure won't stand for it…_

Sora picked that moment to draw his Keyblade.

"There's just something about you that I don't like," he said. "And my hunches have hardly been wrong before. Maybe it's because I know I've fought you before because that's what Kairi said. Maybe it's because, somewhere, deep down inside of me, I remember exactly who you are and I don't like you. Or maybe it's because I don't like seeing Namine scared like that. Whatever way it ends up being, I don't think we're leaving without a fight."

He switched his Keyblade to his left hand, seeing as his right hand was still bandaged and he'd rather not have Kairi yell at him again.

Larxene didn't even seem to notice the gesture. She was laughing at them. Her laugh made Namine cringe more. Even Sora and Kairi flinched a little.

"Oh, Namine," Larxene said, putting her hands on her hips. "You have him wrapped around your little finger! How is _that _working out for you and Kairi?"

"Wrapped around her…" Kairi began, confused. "Oh, like…"

She didn't even finish her statement, she actually started laughing. Which thoroughly confused Larxene.

"Namine and I aren't together, if that's what you're suggesting," Sora said, picking up on where Kairi was going with her incomplete sentences. "But as a friend, I don't want to see Namine scared like that. Besides, I kinda sorta have Riku's blade hanging over me like an axe when it comes to things like this."

"Riku?" Larxene asked. "Not that Rep—"

"Shut up!"

It was the first time Namine had spoken up. Slowly, she looked up at Larxene. She appeared to be glaring with all of her might. Larxene didn't seem to be all that taken aback, however.

"My best friend," Sora said, through gritted teeth. "But it's not a story I'm going to go into for you. Kairi, Namine, are you with me?"

As he said that, he brandished his blade.

"Unfortunately," Namine spat. "I can't help you. Because I _refuse _to touch her memory. I won't go there. However, I will take care of your Cures and whatnot."

Kairi summoned her blade. "I'm with you," she said.

Sora nodded at her, a small smile growing on his face.

"I don't even know where to begin," Larxene said, sighing as if it were a big issue. "The real Riku? Touching _my _memories? The Baby and… hmm, I don't have a name for you…" She glared at Kairi as she said this. "Well, never mind that. The two of you fighting _moi_? That thought alone is laughable!"

No one laughed. Neither did Sora or Kairi back down.

Larxene sighed again, as if they were just ruining her day making her go through with this. "Well, if it's a fight you want…"

She summoned her knives in a charge of lightning.

"It's a fight you will _get_!"

The four of them were transported to one of Castle Oblivion's separate battlefields. Even though they had been turned off at one point before, the effects of the program that had been run had worn off. Namine was just thankful that she had been transported too, since she didn't exactly have a weapon out.

If Sora and Kairi were fazed by the sudden change of scenery, they didn't show it. Larxene hadn't even batted an eyelash.

"I have one request," Namine said, her face set in a frown.

All eyes actually turned to her.

"Take your hood down," she continued, pointing rather ominously at Larxene. "I want to see your face when Sora and Kairi beat you—again!"

"Oh _look_, Namine's grown a spine!" Larxene taunted. "The little bitty Memory…"

She was cut off once again by Kairi. However, instead of interrupting her with words, Kairi rammed her Keyblade into Larxene, butting her back. In the process she also knocked back Larxene's hood.

"I'm tired of you talking," Kairi spat. "Very, _very _tired of it."

Larxene growled and launched herself at Kairi, charging lightning as she did so.


	31. Up Down Adventure

**Author's Note: **I have stuff to say about this chapter... but it'll go in the blog. In other news, this is parallel with the chapter I just posted, but I'm still behind rar. I'm getting there. Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"So quick to anger. But perhaps you can tell me where Sora is..."<p>

xx

"I know now is _probably _not the best time to be asking you questions," Xion said as they made their way through the crowded streets of Port Royal. "But how, exactly, are you planning on training us? We're kind of on the job right now…"

"I was trained on the job," Riku said. "Therefore, you will be trained on the job."

"I was trained on the job," Roxas mused.

Xion sighed.

"Do you _want _to be Keyblade Masters?" Riku asked.

"Well, yes," Xion replied.

"Then today your training is on the job. Ideally, I'd like to work on combos. However, if that's not possible, we can work on magic, or even just the average hack-and-slash. Oh, and tactics in general. Today's main tactic is blending in and not charging into things."

"I'm not Sora…"

"We worked for the Organization, half the job was blending in…"

"…do you just automatically assume that…"

"…who do you think you're…"

"…do you think we're dumb?"

"…you must think we're dumb!"

Riku turned around to stare at the other two. They were both glaring at him with similar expressions. He merely blinked at them before turning back around and continuing to walk. He knew they'd follow.

It wasn't long before he ran into Will. He had never actually met Will before, but he knew who the man was. Plus, the first thing he said was rather indicative:

"Ah, someone I haven't asked yet; have you seen Elizabeth?"

"No," Riku replied. "But we're looking for her too."

"Who are you?"

"Friends of Sora's," Roxas replied.

"We're here to help," Xion added.

"I would like to ask you how that counts as blending in," Riku muttered.

"I take it you really don't have any leads as to where she might be?" Xion asked, completely ignoring Riku. Will merely shook his head.

"Where was she last?" Riku asked.

"We were all staying in the inn," Will said. "We were working on plans for getting Jack back from Davy Jones' locker."

Riku noticed that Will's face went rather dark at the mention of Jack's name, though he couldn't be sure as to why. Jack had done _something _though. And Will now had very mixed feelings about him.

"Do we need to be worrying about Elizabeth, or about Jack?" Roxas asked.

Xion looked at him as if really wondering how he could ask such a tactless question. Somehow, Riku didn't find this at all surprising.

"We need to be worrying about Elizabeth," Will said through clenched teeth.

"Take us to where she was seen last," Riku said. "Maybe we can pick up something."

"You're friends of Sora's, right?" Will asked.

The three of them nodded.

"Sorry, I'm just having a hard time figuring out who I can trust."

"Unfortunately, I have nothing to prove my credibility," Riku said. He turned to Roxas and Xion, both of whom shrugged.

"I helped out Elizabeth the last time I was here, to be honest," Riku continued.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, she was looking for you, heading to Tortuga… we would have stayed longer if it wasn't for the Xehanort Replica."

"I do remember her saying something about that," Will said, scratching his chin.

"Look, are you going to let us help you, or not?" Xion asked, crossing her arms over her chest. "Because we're here to rescue Elizabeth with or without your help."

Will sighed. "Follow me."

He took off in the direction of the aforementioned inn and the others followed him. Once in the inn, Will took them to what had been Elizabeth's bedroom.

"No sign of struggle," he said gruffly as they walked in.

Riku sniffed the air. Then he frowned.

"That scent, I recognize it."

"Scent?" Will asked.

"Riku has an abnormally good sense of smell," Xion explained.

Will didn't even bother to ask.

Riku frowned.

"Well, I know why there's no sign of a struggle," Riku said. "The person we're dealing with may or may not have the ability to use dark corridors."

"Oh lovely," Roxas muttered. "So how do we know where they are?"

"Oh, I doubt he took her off-world," Riku said. "I've just got to find the scent again." He turned to Will. "Do you know of any place secluded and out of the way, but still close?"

Will raised an eyebrow at Riku.

"What was Axel talking about when he said that you could use a star shard to take you directly to a person?" Roxas said.

"Oh, we could try that," Xion said.

Riku frowned. "Seems risky."

"Got any other plans?" Xion said.

"Well, theoretically," Roxas said. "We could use the star shard to get us just _outside _the room that whoever it is has Elizabeth in. If the star shard is accurate enough to take us to a person, wouldn't it be accurate enough to do that?"

"Who has Elizabeth anyway?" Xion asked. "It's not another stupid Xehanort Replica, is it? I thought we were done with those."

"No, it's not a Xehanort Replica," Riku said.

Before he could say who it was, though, Will interrupted:

"Whatever it is that you have a plan for, can we just go with it? I'm afraid it will be too late if we keep stalling."

"Star shard, then?" Roxas said, pulling one out of his pocket.

"Go for it," Riku said. "But be ready with your blades."

He had already drawn his own. Roxas and Xion summoned their own. Even Will pulled his sword out of the sheath.

"Um…" Roxas said, looking at the star shard in his hands. "Take us to the room outside of where Elizabeth is."

The star shard activated and the four of them were bounced away.

They were in a building made of stone, in a hallway lit only by torches.

"Talk about dark, dank and dreary," Xion muttered. "This place makes the Dark Margin look like a beach paradise."

"Well, at least there aren't any Heartless," Roxas said.

"Please don't say that," Riku said. "Because as soon as you do, there will be."

Sure enough, some Neoshadows appeared.

"Sorry," Roxas muttered, slicing his Keyblade two Neoshadows in one swipe.

"I dislike how you can do that," Xion said, whacking one over the head.

"What, he's killing them," Riku pointed out.

"Yes, but his Keyblade slides through Neoshadows like they're butter!"  
>"They're kind of my thing," Roxas said, shrugging.<p>

"Should we try a combo now, or should we wait on that?" Xion asked.

"We should wait on that," Riku said, stabbing his blade through the last Neoshadow.

"Is that the last of them?" Will asked.

"For now," Riku said, walking up to the door that had been neglected until that very moment. They had been too busy admiring the scenery and killing Neoshadows. He put his ear up to the door to listen.

"I'm warning you," came a woman's voice. "There will be people coming for me."

"That's Elizabeth, all right," Riku muttered.

"Elizabeth's in there?" Will asked, a twinge of surprise in his voice.

Riku nodded.

"We should go in there, then!"

Riku put a finger over his lips. "She doesn't sound like she's in any immediate danger. Let me try and figure out just how many people are in there keeping watch over her. Roxas, Xion, how about you go to the other end of the hallway and make sure we didn't draw any attention with that little Heartless incident."

Without argument, Xion and Roxas quietly made their way down the hall. Will didn't say anything else either.

Riku put his ear back to the door.

"Did you just _seriously _spit in my face? What sort of lady are you?"

"I'm a bloody pirate!"

Riku snorted. He listened for a bit more, but couldn't hear any other voices besides the two. He pulled away from the door and nodded curtly. About that time, Roxas and Xion came back.

"Anything?" Riku asked.

"The place is deserted," Xion said. "Not even any more random Heartless."

"Who's all in there?" Will asked, gesturing to the door.

"Just Elizabeth and a former Organization member."

"Which one?" Roxas and Xion asked simultaneously.

Riku smirked. "I think I'll just let you figure that out when we go in there."

Xion frowned. Roxas made a face.

"So what's the plan, then?" Will asked.

"Well, I'm going to break down this door," Riku said. "Roxas, Xion and I are going to go after the man while you get out with Elizabeth."

"Sounds simple enough," Will said.

"Yeah, most plans do," Riku said, turning back to look at the door.

"Do we really need to break the door down?" Roxas asked. "I mean, even if it was locked—and I don't think you've checked yet, couldn't we just unlock it?"

"We're going for an element of surprise here, not stealth," Riku spluttered.

"And weren't you just talking earlier about not charging into things?" Xion argued.

Riku frowned. "I am breaking down this door, end of discussion."

Roxas and Xion both just shrugged. Will looked a little lost.

Riku looked the door up and down, then backed up a couple of steps. He then launched himself at the door. He hit it full-on and knocked it down. The door crashed into the room, the top of it narrowly missing the back of Elizabeth's chair. Riku went down into a crouched position to keep himself from falling over. He decided he was going to ignore the fact that he had almost hit Elizabeth in the head. He had succeeded in startling both her and her captor, however.

"What is this nonsense!" said captor spluttered.

"Her rescue party," Riku said, launching himself back up at the man.

"Will!" Elizabeth exclaimed, upon seeing him.

"Elizabeth," Will replied, heading over to her. He pulled out a knife and began cutting the ropes that bound her to the chair. "He didn't hurt you, did he?"

Elizabeth shook her head.

Xion looked at the proximity from the top of the door to Elizabeth's chair. "We really should have talked him out of that idea," she mused.

"Do you think we should help him?" Roxas asked, looking over at Riku and the man dressed in an Organization cloak.

"Well, he seems to be doing just fine on his own at the moment," Xion said, relaxing the grip on her Keyblade, but not letting go so completely that it disappeared.

Riku swiped his blade at the man, but his opponent refused to draw his weapon—or put up anything in the way of defense. This seemed to bother Riku.

About that time, Will got Elizabeth free and the two of them started heading out the door. However, their progress was slowed because Elizabeth seemed intent on seeing what was going to happen next—much to Will's chagrin.

Riku paused in his fighting. He kept his blade between him and his opponent, but did not strike. He wanted said opponent to make a move of his own outside of elusion.

The opponent turned to look at Roxas and Xion.

"Well, well, the Keyblade Wielder's Nobody and the Replica."

Roxas and Xion both brought up their blades.

"So quick to anger," the man said, laughing. "But perhaps you can tell me where Sora is. I have been just so eager to meet him again. With all of my restored heart!"

"Sora's far away from here," Xion said, frowning. "And whatever you have planned, it can't be good."

He sighed. "I see, so I can assume that you are on Axel's side then."

Roxas and Xion both snorted.

"If you can call Axel on a side other than his own, sure," Roxas said. "He's more on our side than we are on his, but call it what you will."

"Are you going to fight back?" Riku asked. "Or are you going to give me a reason to defeat you without you drawing your weapon?"

"So cocky. That much has not changed about you, Riku."

Riku's nostrils flared. "What do you want, Marluxia?"


	32. Larxene the Ruthless

**Author's Note: **I love this chapter. You'll see why. It's just amazing. I have lots to say about both this chapter and the last couple that I've forgotten to mention in the blogs... so expect a longer-than-usual blog post later today. (Tomorrow at the latest... I do have class...)

* * *

><p>"It doesn't seem that far-fetched of an idea that Larxene's just <em>that <em>evil."

xx

Naturally, Sora got in between Larxene and Kairi. His blade took the lightning and shivered with the jolt of electricity. Sora only grimaced and struck his Keyblade to the ground, as if to nullify the blast. Oathkeeper scraped across the ground, sending up its own sparks as it did so. Larxene growled and sliced at him with her knives, he dodgerolled out of her way, sending her forward in a slightly off-balanced manner. Kairi took that moment to hit her with her Keyblade.

Larxene didn't like that.

She threw another bolt of electricity at Kairi and this time, Sora wasn't able to get in between the blast and Kairi. Kairi threw up her Keyblade for protection. The lightning went directly into the blade. Kairi was affected more by the lightning than Sora was.

_How does he deal with it? _she asked herself.

Following his lead, she bashed Destiny's Embrace into the ground. The electrifying jolts calmed. Kairi shook her head rapidly, still feeling tingly from the electricity. Namine threw up a Cure for Kairi to negate the effects on Kairi's health the lightning had caused.

Larxene took advantage of Kairi's momentary off-guard and launched herself at her. Kairi looked up just in time and kicked Larxene in the gut. It didn't do much to knock her back, but it certainly slowed her down.

"Is that all you've got?" she asked.

"Way to sound like Riku," Sora growled.

Larxene paused and stood up straight. She rested one hand on her hip and brought the other one up to her chin in a thinking gesture.

"I _really _need to come up with a name for you," she mused. "I can't throw insults at you without a demeaning name, now can I?" She laughed. "I call him the baby and her the Memory Witch, but what shall I call you? Princess?"

Kairi growled and ran forward, swiping at Larxene with her Keyblade. Larxene was too fast and jumped back out of the way almost casually. She laughed.

"I think I'll stick with Princess. It's true, is it not? And it can sound _so _rude!"

"Fire!" Kairi shouted, pointing her Keyblade at Larxene.

That made contact. Larxene growled.

"I told you I was sick of your talking," Kairi growled.

Larxene rolled her eyes. Honestly rolled her eyes. She pointed a finger at Namine and casually threw a lightning her way. Sora and Kairi, neither of whom were close to Namine in any way, both gasped.

"Weakest link," Larxene cackled. "Always go for the weakest link."

Namine smirked.

"Protect," she whispered, throwing up her hand.

The lightning bounced off her newly-made shield and disappeared.

"What?" Larxene shrieked. "Since when can _you _do magic?"

"I've gotta agree with her, here," Sora said. "When did you learn _that _spell?"

"Riku taught it to me," Namine replied with a shrug. "He's been a little paranoid since the Neverland incident."

"Riku's been paranoid since Ansem," Sora muttered.

Larxene yawned. She made a big show of covering it. Then she rolled her eyes and stuck both hands on her hips.

"Well, I can say that I just _love _the conversation that this has digressed to. However, if all we are going to do is stand here and catch up on things, I will have to pass. I have better things to be doing with my time…"

She didn't finish her thought, however. Sora had taken the time to throw a Blizzaga at her. The giant ice crystal had formed directly over her head and fell right on her. She was definitely reeling from the blow, though she wouldn't be stunned for long.

"Not getting away that easily," he said. "We should start using combos. I could Drive… that would probably be the most effective."

"If it will make her shut up, I can honestly say I don't care," Kairi said.

"Right, I'll try for Valor," Sora said.

"Power!" he shouted.

Kairi disappeared. Sora found Destiny's Embrace in his right hand.

"Makes sense, I suppose," he said. He turned to Namine. "Cover me, I don't have any magic."

Namine nodded. "Got it!"

Sora ran up to Larxene and swung both Destiny's Embrace and Oathkeeper in tandem to land a rather hard blow on Larxene's face. Larxene hadn't even covered from the Blizzaga yet, so she was sent reeling even further. However, this time she just became very angry and ran up to Sora and swiped at him with her knives. He blocked them, but unfortunately twisted his right wrist.

"Let's not tell Kairi about this…" he muttered.

Larxene, thankfully, was at least stunned from his block and he was able to land a few one-handed attacks on her before she recovered. Namine took the time to Cure Sora and as soon as Larxene had recovered (even despite the attacks on her) Sora was able to backflip nimbly out of the way and avoid her until Valor Form ran out.

"You probably could have continued to attack her," Namine said.

"Don't want to risk it," Sora said, making an effort to not cradle his wrist even though it didn't hurt any more. The thought of it hurting alone—and then what Kairi would say.

"Drat, she's still around," Kairi muttered, reappearing.

"Another Drive Form?" Namine asked as Larxene got her bearings after the last failed attack on Sora (who had moved out of the way too fast, causing Larxene to run into a pillar.)

"I can try for Wisdom, but I need to get my gauge back up again. Unless you happen to know Aura."

"Know what?"

"Yeah, didn't think so."

"Namine and I can try for a combo," Kairi said, running over.

"Kairi, my knowledge of magic is really limited to defensive stuff and we all know I can't wield any weapons."

"You can wield Light," Kairi pointed out. "I've seen you."

"If you think it'll work," Namine said. "I'm willing to try."

Kairi reached out and grabbed one of Namine's hands in her own. In unison, they threw their arms into the air. A bubble of light surrounded the two of them. Sora shielded his eyes but still tried to see what was going on. Larxene even paused and squinted.

When the light faded, only Kairi appeared to still be standing. Sora gaped at the rather elaborate pink and white dress she was wearing. Her Keyblade seemed to glow with white-hot power. She opened her eyes and they glowed white, too.

"Well, this can't be good," Larxene muttered, backing up.

Kairi raised her left hand, her wrist arched up and her fingers angled down. Little light forms came out of the ground, like little puppets attached to proverbial strings Kairi was controlling. Sora couldn't help but think that they looked just a little bit like Heartless, except they lacked antennae and their eyes were bright blue and their skin was pure white.

Kairi brought her wrist down and thrust her fingers forward. The light forms began making their way toward Larxene.

Larxene set her face into a scowl and started sending lightning bolts at the light forms one by one, taking them out.

Sora looked over at Kairi, who didn't seem to be all that inclined to move. He shrugged, as if not too surprised by this. He readied his blade and ran at Larxene. The light forms paid him no attention, focusing only on Larxene. Sora started attacking her purely to get his Drive Gauge up, not because he thought the light forms wouldn't do a good enough job.

Kairi raised her Keyblade and pointed it directly to the sky. Two more light forms appeared out of it, though they were more distinctive than the ones already attacking Larxene. These two were birds. One was a falcon, the other was an owl. The two birds soared up high before spiraling down upon Larxene.

Larxene shrieked and focused her attacks on the two birds, rather than the more shapeless light forms. It wasn't particularly helping that Sora was also landing attack after attack (with his left hand, even) on her. This wasn't going as well as she had originally hoped. Kairi was stronger than originally anticipated, and go figure, Namine could fight—sort of.

The nameless light forms began to dwindle, though the birds continued to remain a pest. Larxene was able to bring down the falcon, only because the falcon appeared to be fighting more recklessly than the owl for whatever reason. The owl just flew back to Kairi and disappeared back into the Keyblade.

Kairi raised Destiny's Embrace one more time. She brought it down and pointed it at Larxene. This time, a lion appeared out of the Keyblade and charged right at her.

Rather appropriately, Larxene swore. Even Sora thought it best to just dodgeroll out of the way. He knew that the lion was on his side, but…

Well, the lion trampled Larxene. She fell flat on her back and had just enough time to roll out of the way of a second pounce. She readied herself for a third pounce, but the lion made its way back to Kairi. It disappeared and the light surrounding Kairi began to diminish. She had run out of power.

When the light had completely faded, both Kairi and Namine were standing there again—each in their regular clothes. Kairi held her Keyblade, Namine's hands were unsurprisingly empty. Both looked incredibly tired. Namine crouched down on the ground and Kairi leaned on her Keyblade for support. Sora leapt back over to where Larxene was to continue attacking. He was _this _close to getting his Drive Gauge up enough to try for Valor again, or perhaps Wisdom, since it only took one Keyblade…

Namine was just about to throw up an ether for herself and Kairi when he phased into Wisdom form and Namine disappeared.

Sora wasted no time in shooting orbs of magic at Larxene. He was able to stay out of her reach as he did so. He almost got the feeling that what he was doing was too easy.

Larxene screamed.

"I am done with this battle!" she shrieked. "I can't fight all three of you at once." She cackled. "So I'm going to leave now, but then, I am going to pick you off one by one!"

She formed a dark corridor around herself and disappeared.

Sora blinked and phased out of Wisdom Form.

"Figures," Namine muttered, tossing up the ether. Even though she herself didn't need it anymore, Kairi certainly benefitted.

"So, that's it?" Kairi asked, standing up straight. "She just left?"

"Her warning is a bit chilling, however," Sora said.

"We'll just keep an eye out for her," Namine said. "I think she was just angry for the most part. I _hope _she was just angry for the most part."

The battleground disappeared from around them and they found themselves once more in one of Castle Oblivion's hallways.

"Well, now what?" Kairi asked, banishing her Keyblade. "We've figured out who was poking around here and we won a battle against her."

"We've also discovered that it's an old enemy who wants revenge," Namine added.

"We should probably check in with the Vexen Replicas," Sora said, banishing his Keyblade as well. "Then, we can head off to Port Royal to see if Riku, Roxas and Xion need help. Or, we can just go back to Destiny Islands on the chance that they don't need help and have already completed their task."

"Vexen Replicas first," Namine said. "Then give me a chance to sit down with my sketchbook. I might be able to gauge where the others are in the process."

"Psychic," Kairi muttered.

Namine shrugged.

"This coming from the girls who are telepathic," Sora mused.

"You and Roxas could probably do the same thing if you listened," Kairi said. "Namine and I are just more accustomed to listening for each other."

"I'll have to try it out sometime," Sora said, though he didn't sound like he actually would. Namine and Kairi decided it wasn't worth it to press the issue.

xx

The three of them made their way back up to where the Vexen Replicas were in the Computer Room.

"We figured out who it was," Sora said as they entered.

"Yes, that ruthless Larxene," 34 said.

"I was going to go for savage," 27 said. "But ruthless works too."

"I noticed you were unable to actually defeat her," 42 observed.

"It takes more when they're not Nobodies," Namine said. "And she fled that battle before we were able to finish her."

"She'll be back," Sora said. "She said so."

"Will she be back here?" 27 asked.

"No telling, really," Kairi replied. "We never did figure out why she was here in the first place…"

"If she does come back though," Sora said. "Just fight her off. I'd say bar the door, but she can form corridors."

"Which means that she's been dealing with darkness," Namine said. "Because Somebodies can't normally do things like that."

"It doesn't seem that far-fetched of an idea that Larxene's just _that _evil," Kairi pointed out. "Not to me anyway."

"I'd believe that," Sora said, shrugging.

Namine grimaced.


	33. Marluxia's Graceful Blade

**Author's Note: **Yes, I am aware the updates are coming fast. But, think of it this way, you don't have to be left at a cliffhanger (not that I've done one of those in a while... watch out.) You also won't have to wait much for stuff. I'm just doing this until I catch up to rar. Or I can't write fast enough anymore. Whichever comes first.

In other news, if there are any questions that you have asked and haven't seen answered, check my blog. That's where I answer most questions so I can avoid long author's notes (like this one.) However, if your question is still not answered, leave me a comment because I may have forgotten/missed it. Or it's just spoilers and you'll find out soon enough.

Without further ado, the chapter!

* * *

><p>"But doesn't that just mean we're waiting for them to make trouble again?"<p>

xx

As soon as Riku had identified the man in the Organization cloak as Marluxia, Marluxia saw fit to remove his hood. He shook out his pink hair in a way that only Marluxia could. He summoned his scythe in a flurry of petals and promptly attacked Riku.

"Do you think he needs help now?" Roxas asked.

"Well, I'm wondering if actually, they need help…" Xion mused, looking over at Will and Elizabeth, who still hadn't left the room.

"No, I think he's the real issue here," Roxas said, giving a nod towards Marluxia. "I don't think Elizabeth wants to miss the action. So they're not leaving."

"I _think _Riku's got it covered."

As she said this, Riku jumped over the scythe that had been aimed at his gut. However, in a split-second decision to turn the jump into a backflip, Riku fell on his backside. Somehow, though, he managed to block the next scythe attack and even send the scythe flying; giving him time to get up. He didn't even cry out.

"Forgive me," Xion said, turning to look at Roxas. "But I'm having a hard time believing that this is where we need to be focusing our energy. I know Marluxia doesn't have the greatest of track records, but it feels like Riku just dove into this one. I mean, did you _see _how close he was with the door and the chair? And he was _just _telling us about not charging into things!"

"Well, wouldn't we have done the same thing if he had just been some random kidnapper and not a guy from our former job—that we didn't even like! Maybe this is another lesson for us anyway. Riku's pretty hard to understand. This could be a test."

"Oh, I suppose you have a point there," Xion admitted. "With all of that."

Roxas had a look of 'I-told-you-so' on his face.

"So, back to me asking if you think he needs help," he said.

"Well, there's an easy way to figure that out," Xion said. "Hey, Riku! Do you need help?"

"Help would be nice, actually," Riku replied, dodging out of the way of yet a scythe attack aimed for his head.

Marluxia grinned maniacally and pulled his scythe back. Roxas and Xion readied their blades in preparation to attack. Riku braced himself for Marluxia's next attack, trying to be ready to go any possible direction.

Unfortunately, because he was ready for Marluxia to swing the scythe and try and catch him with sharp the blade, he wasn't prepared for Marluxia to thrust the scythe forward and hit him directly in the chest with the blunt top of the blade. He flew backwards and hit the wall with a _thhd. _If Xion wasn't mistaken, she could have sworn she saw the wall waver a little. She winced a little.

Riku made a strangled grunting noise.

"We should probably do a Combo, or a Limit," Roxas said, looking at Xion.

Xion needed to only look at Marluxia, who had swung his scythe around so it was sitting on his shoulder rather menacingly, to agree with Roxas wholeheartedly.

"Event Horizon again?" Xion asked.

"We need something stronger," Roxas argued.

Xion grabbed his left hand with her right. "Then we both need to think stronger."

"I think we can do that," he replied, squeezing her hand.

Xion raised her Keyblade to the sky. (Well, ceiling, but that's beside the point.) It charged with light. She swung her Keyblade down, flinging light with it. The light hit Marluxia in the chest and knocked him backwards.

Riku had recovered from his own knock back and readied his Keyblade for another attack. He didn't attack, however; he waited to see what Roxas and Xion were going to do next.

Xion raised her Keyblade again. It charged once more with light. But this time, not only did it glow with light, but both Xion and Roxas started glowing as well.

Roxas looked up at Xion and grinned, almost mischievously. Xion gave a nod and Roxas let go of her hand, tearing off after Marluxia. He let loose a flurry of attacks onto him. Riku took this as his cue to attack once more and launched himself at Marluxia.

Xion let loose another light attack with her Keyblade.

"Elizabeth," Will hissed. "I really think we should get out of here. This isn't our fight."

"He made it our fight when he kidnapped me," Elizabeth hissed back.

"I don't think we have any weapon capable of fighting him," Will replied.

Elizabeth glared at him.

Marluxia, when he got a moment in between all the attacks he was receiving, warped to the other side of the room, over by Elizabeth and Will.

Elizabeth pulled a knife out of… somewhere… and jabbed it at Marluxia.

"Enough!" Marluxia roared.

He swung his scythe at the two of them. Riku managed to get himself in between Marluxia and them and throw up a shield. Marluxia growled and swung again, harder. Roxas rushed over to aid Riku in the shield. Xion started preparing another light attack.

Marluxia was about to strike again, but he was interrupted this time, by a dark corridor.

All eyes turned to the corridor. The figure that walked out was dressed in a cloak like Marluxia was wearing. However, this figure was more slight, and somehow, more menacing-looking.

"There you are!" she said. "I thought I saw hint of your whereabouts when I was sneaking around Castle Oblivion."

"Larxene?" Roxas whispered.

Riku made a hissing noise. He had never dealt with Larxene personally, but every time Namine spoke of her… well, nothing nice was said.

Marluxia turned to her. "I see you escaped wherever it was Axel sent you."

"I can say the same to you. Shall we continue our original plan?"

"Yes, I think we shall."

"I haven't been able to find Sora, however."

Everyone in the room got the distinct impression that Larxene rolled her eyes at him, even with her hood up.

"I just dealt with the baby. And I'll let you know how well _that _went when we're in," she paused, looking around between Riku, Roxas and Xion. "Different company."

"I take it didn't go well, considering you're sulking," Riku pointed out.

Larxene turned to him, glaring. She formed a dark corridor.

"Come, Marluxia. We have better things to be doing than wasting our time here."

She marched through the dark corridor, but not before glaring at Riku, Roxas and Xion. Marluxia followed her through the corridor without so much as another word. He seemed to be marveling at the fact that she could form a corridor. Before any of the rest of them had the thought to follow the two, the corridor had closed.

"Well, _that _was interesting," Xion said, banishing her blade. She was still glowing with light a little, but that was fading.

"Does anyone else get the impression that Larxene has Marluxia wrapped around her little finger?" Roxas asked.

"It would appear so," Riku said.

"Can I ask what just happened?" Will asked, sounding completely bewildered.

"Well, we were fighting Marluxia," Xion began. "But then Larxene showed up and they went elsewhere."

"Not that it's the last we'll see of them," Roxas added. "It sounds like they're after us."

"What did Marluxia want with you?" Riku asked, looking at Elizabeth.

"He wanted to know where Sora was. But I haven't seen him since that incident with that other man in the black cloak."

"The Xehanort Replica," Riku said quietly.

Elizabeth nodded.

"But didn't that girl say that she had just dealt with Sora?" Will asked.

"Sora's fine," Roxas said. "I would know if he wasn't."

"Like I said earlier," Riku said. "She was sulking a little. Which means the combination of Sora, Kairi and Namine…"

He stopped, his voice catching in his throat. He almost seemed to pale a little.

"Is something wrong?" Xion asked.

"Namine and Larxene…" Riku growled. "Larxene was _horrible _to… she had _better _be okay! I will _kill _her if she's not. Sora better have…"

Xion put a hand on Riku's shoulder. "Relax. Namine can take care of herself. And probably Sora and Kairi, too, if she needed. You were _just _saying that Larxene was sulking, which means things didn't go well for Larxene. If Namine was injured in any way, I'm pretty sure Larxene would have been gloating just a little."

"How do you figure?" Roxas asked. "You hardly ever hung out with Larxene. _I _hardly ever hung out with Larxene."

"Roxas, I hacked the computer in Castle Oblivion. Twice. I know more about Larxene than I'd like to."

Riku's eye twitched behind his bangs, but he did seem to calm down a little.

"Why do they want revenge on you?" Elizabeth asked. "I mean, I get that baddies want revenge for the stupidest things, but…"

"Well, Sora did kill both of them," Roxas said, shrugging.

"But they're both alive," Will pointed out.

"He killed their Nobodies," Xion explained.

Will and Elizabeth still regarded the three of them with blank stares.

"Oh boy," Xion said. "I forgot normal people don't know the craziness that surrounds our lives."

"What, like I'm dating a Replica?" Roxas asked, grinning.

Xion looked up at him, grinning the same as he was.

He leaned down and the two of them brushed noses.

Riku rolled his eyes.

"Ignore them," he told Will and Elizabeth. "Also, ignore the part about Replicas. Anyway, so, remember the Heartless?"

"It's hard to forget," Will said. "They still show up."

"Right," Riku said. "Well, when someone becomes a Heartless, they are essentially split in two and the other half of them becomes a Nobody."

"You mean the Heartless were once _people_?" Elizabeth asked, sounding a tad disgusted.

"Well, most of them at least," Riku said, shrugging. "Sometimes I have to wonder if the darkness just manifests itself into Heartless form just for the fun of it. But I digress. Some Nobodies are human-like and take on after they did when they were whole, except they don't have emotions because they're heart went with the Heartless…"

"Bit of a misnomer there, don't you think?" Elizabeth mused.

Riku shrugged. "Anyway, Marluxia and Larxene were both Nobodies a couple of years ago. Sora destroyed them both. Obviously they came back as Somebodies again because they had both their Heartless and their Nobody destroyed so they were able to be whole once again and cause havoc."

"I am going to pretend that that makes more sense than it does," Will said.

Riku shrugged again. "I can't explain it any plainer."

"Your life is complicated," Elizabeth said.

"Tell us something we don't know," Roxas said.

"Well," Xion asked. "Now what? Did we do good on our training?"

"I would say so," Riku said. "That Light Limit thing was quite effective."

"Call of Light," Xion said. "That's what it's called."

"When did we decide this?" Roxas asked.

"Just now. You named the last one."

"It already had a name…"

"What about that shield thing that you and Roxas did? That looked combo-ish," Xion said, ignoring Roxas' argument.

"What, that?" Roxas said. "It's just a shield that the two of us can do. It's effective against just about everything."

"We can also push it outward and knock enemies back," Riku said. "However, I don't think that would have been very effective against Marluxia there."

Roxas shrugged.

"So, what do we do now?" he asked. "Do we just head home?"

"Is there anything we still need to do here?" Xion asked.

The three of them turned to Will and Elizabeth.

"I doubt you want to help us go look for Jack in Davy Jones' Locker," Elizabeth said. "It will be dreadfully boring."

Will rolled his eyes. "We probably could use the help, but it'll be dangerous."

Riku snorted. "We're rather used to danger. However, I'm not sure if we're the right people to be helping you. It seems like we tend to bring more trouble with us than it's worth."

"He has a point," Elizabeth said. "Xehasnort Replica."

Roxas, Riku and Xion tried not to laugh.

"Do you just not want their help?" Will asked.

"I don't want to do this at all…" Elizabeth muttered.

Before anyone else could reply, three more people joined them by route of star shard. Sora, Kairi and Namine stood on the other side of the room.

"I'm going to assume that Marluxia and Larxene were already here," Namine said, pointing to the chair with a pencil.

"Yup."

"Good," Namine replied. "I couldn't be sure."

"How could a chair answer your question?" Elizabeth asked.

"Just the way I drew the scene," Namine responded.

Elizabeth decided it wasn't worth it to ask.

"You knew Larxene was coming?" Roxas asked.

"She left us in Castle Oblivion," Kairi said. "It wasn't until we reported back with the Vexen Replicas to let them know that it was _her _that was bothering them that Namine got a chance to sit down and draw out that Larxene had come after you guys. We came here right after…"

"But things look like they turned out okay for you guys," Sora interrupted.

Kairi allowed the interruption and agreed with Sora.

"Are you okay?" Riku asked.

"Well, yeah, of course," Sora said, putting his hands behind his head.

Riku frowned. "Singular 'you,' Sora. I was talking to Namine."

Sora blinked, not even knowing what to say to that.

Namine blushed and nervously tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.

"I'm fine, Riku. Not even a scratch."

"But, Larxene…"

"Was dealt with."

Her tone clearly said that if it was going to be discussed, it was going to be discussed later. Riku got that hint and swallowed, nodding.

"Told you," Xion muttered.

"So, where were we?" Roxas asked.

"Will and I were just leaving," Elizabeth said, grabbing Will's arm dragging him out of the room.

"Oh sure, _now _she wants to leave," Will said.

"Barbossa will be waiting."

Before any of the others could say anything, the two of them had disappeared down the hallway.

"I wonder if they know the way back to wherever it was we were earlier," Xion mused. "Because we took a star shard here."

Roxas shrugged. Riku didn't have anything to say either.

"Did they need any more help?" Sora asked.

"Elizabeth seemed to think not," Riku said.

"Riku did say that we tend to bring more trouble," Roxas said. "Which, I don't really get…"

Xion raised an eyebrow. "Marluxia just said he was looking for Sora. And he wasn't even _here _when that happened."

"Oh, well, _Sora _brings trouble. You and I don't."

Xion didn't have an argument for him.

"Well, while we're on the subject," Kairi said. "What did Marluxia want with Sora?"

"Revenge," Riku replied simply. "I think he's angry you…"

Riku paused.

"I what?" Sora asked.

"Well, you did take care of his Nobody," Riku said. "I think he's angry."

"Larxene's angry too," Namine said.

"No surprise there," Riku muttered.

"Should we go after them?" Roxas asked.

Riku and Namine both shook their heads no.

"Not at the moment, anyway," Namine said. "I know this sounds strange, but we should probably wait and see what they're up to, rather than go and chase them across however many worlds."

"Sounds pretty logical," Sora said. "But doesn't that just mean we're waiting for them to make trouble again?"

"Won't be too long," Riku said.

"Does that mean we're done here?" Kairi asked.

"I would say so," Xion replied.

"Cool, I'd like to go back to the Islands then."

Sora pulled out his star shard. "Let's go!"

xx

As soon as they all got back to the Islands, conversation burst out.

"You know, I hate to butt in," Sora said, looking at Kairi. "But you and Namine should _probably _talk to Aerith or someone about that Limit of yours. Because I know I'll be no help."

"You know, that's probably a good idea," Kairi agreed.

"What Limit?" Xion asked.

"Oh, it was amazing!" Sora said.

"Do tell!"

The three of them started walking off. Roxas looked between them and Riku and Namine and promptly decided that he'd rather be with the larger group.

"Limit?" Riku asked as Roxas ran off.

"Oh, I'm not exactly sure how to describe it," Namine said. "I know I physically disappeared from the battlefield. It was like I was joined with Kairi once again. Except, we had a whole ton of magic. We very well may have scared Larxene with all the light attacks we threw at her."

"Is that what you meant by 'dealt with'?"

She nodded.

"How did running into Larxene go, anyway?" Riku asked. "I know you and her have a… history."

Namine frowned. "I was paralyzed with fear at first. But Kairi yelled at me to get over it. So, I did."

"She didn't hurt you, did she?"

"Never laid a finger on me."

"Did she say anything…" he frowned, trying to come up with an adjective that was appropriate.

"She said loads of things," Namine said, answering before he could finish anyway. "All of them were mean. It's nothing new."

Riku had to laugh a little at that, but only after he gauged from Namine that laughter was okay at this point. It was.

She soon joined him in laughing as well.

"So, you'll be talking to Aerith about this Limit then?" Riku asked.

Namine nodded. "That sounds like that's what the plan is. Should be fun."

Riku shrugged, but it was in agreement.


	34. A Sign of Light

**Author's Note: ***tries to remember if there's anything I need to say* Well, I do know I'm really close to being caught up with rar... I'm not exactly sure what the last thing she posted was. But I'm close.

* * *

><p>"Limits tend to work best under stress."<p>

xx

"Well," Kairi said, pocketing the star shard. "Here we are."

"I think you're the first person to _not _take us directly into Aerith's house," Namine mused. "Riku always goes straight in. So do Sora and Roxas."

Kairi shrugged. "I just picture this street when we come here. It's more polite this way, I feel. Even though I'm pretty sure Aerith doesn't really care."

"Funny, this is exactly where we appeared in the parallel universe."

Kairi laughed. "Wouldn't it be funny if we were back there?"

Namine nodded, smiling. "It would."

However, it became pretty obvious that they were in their own universe when Rinoa answered the door. Both girls were pretty sure that if there was a Rinoa in the other universe (which there probably was), she didn't stay in Hollow Bastion. Because, if she did, she probably would have been there last time.

"What brings you two here?" Rinoa asked, smiling.

"Sora sent us," Kairi said.

She cocked her head to one side. "But he's responsible for your training," she said, looking directly at Kairi.

"Except for the fact that he doesn't know how to train when it comes to light attacks," Kairi said, sounding almost apologetic. "He and I were talking about it last night. And even if Roxas had a better idea of how to do so, which he doesn't, he's not in a position to train us."

"Both of them know how to summon light, just not train to make light attacks better," Namine added.

No one mentioned Riku.

"Sora thought that maybe you or Aerith could help us with this," Namine continued. "Riku thought it was a good idea too."

"It's both of you?" Rinoa asked.

The two girls nodded.

"It's a Limit, isn't it?"

They nodded again.

Rinoa grinned. "This should be fun!"

She turned to let Kairi and Namine into the house. As they walked through the front room, Rinoa squealed and skipped a little. Leon looked up from the book he was reading.

"Yes?" he asked.

"I get to train a Keyblade wielder!" Rinoa said, her eyes bright and her grin wide.

Leon shrugged.

Rinoa frowned at him, jokingly patronizing. He raised an eyebrow, but the corners of his mouth twitched up a bit into a smile. She grinned. Kairi and Namine watched the entire silent exchange between the two of them and thought it was rather adorable. The two of them proceeded to make faces at each other.

Aerith poked her head out of the kitchen.

"Oh!" she exclaimed. "We do have company!"

"I don' have enough soup!" Cid grumbled.

From the looks of things, Aerith smacked him with a wooden spoon. But no one could be sure because she was the only one visible from the doorway. However, she did swipe at him and he did yell 'ow!'

"Kairi and Namine want help with one of their Limits," Rinoa said, turning away from her face-making in Leon's direction. He went back to his book.

"I thought I heard something about Light," Aerith said. "Are we talking something smaller like Pearl or Faith or something bigger like the likes of just pure Holy?"

Rinoa turned to look at Kairi and Namine.

Kairi and Namine looked at each other, their eyes going wide.

"I don't think we even know," Kairi said.

"We'll have to see it then," Aerith said. "Plain and simple."

"Lemme guess, you two are gonna go out and help them and leave me to cook, aren't yeh?" Cid asked.

"Is that a problem?" Aerith asked, cocking her head to one side. She wasn't sarcastic or anything, just sincerely asking.

"I don' mind doin' the cookin', I jus' like the help…" Cid mumbled.

"Well, Tifa…" Aerith began.

"Tifa's doing rounds," Leon said, not looking up from his book. Rinoa moved one of her wings so that it was conveniently covering one of the pages.

"That's the one I was reading," he said.

"I know," she replied.

"We aren't causing a problem, are we?" Namine asked.

"Nonsense," Cid replied.

"But, the cooking…" Aerith started.

"I can do the cookin'," Cid said. "I'll even add more soup for the two of yeh."

"That's very kind of you," Kairi said.

"Well, should we go, then?" Aerith asked, already taking off her apron.

Just then, three people came barging through the front door. Tifa, Cloud and Zack were back from their rounds. Zack and Cloud already had their swords slung lazily in their holsters on their backs. Tifa was pocketing her gloves.

"How did rounds go?" Rinoa asked.

"Nothing huge," Zack said. "But everything was Pureblood. There weren't any Emblem."

"Does that mean something?" Kairi asked.

"Possibly," Leon said. "We just don't know what."

"What we do know," Tifa said. "Is that the Emblem Heartless aren't as prominent as they were a week ago."

"And like Zack said, we didn't see any today," Cloud added quietly.

"Aerith, are you going somewhere?" Tifa asked.

"These two need help with a Limit," Aerith said, gesturing to Kairi and Namine.

"It's heavily light-based from what I understand," Rinoa said.

"Sounds exciting," Tifa said. She turned to Kairi and Namine. "You two should have a load of fun. Rinoa and Aerith are both great teachers when it comes to magic."

Kairi and Namine nodded. Tifa went and took the apron from Aerith and put it on herself.

"You don' haf' tah…" Cid began

"Nonsense," Tifa said. "Hand me that spoon."

"Ready to go?" Aerith said, as Cloud and Zack settled down. Well, Cloud settled down on the other end of the couch from Leon. Zack began doing squats.

Kairi and Namine both nodded. Rinoa had resumed the face-making game with Leon. They were trying to get the other one to laugh first. Not surprisingly, Leon was winning. When he noticed that everyone else in the room was looking at them, he flushed red and pointed so that Rinoa realized this too, since her back was to the rest of them.

"Sorry," she said.

Aerith shook her head and made a dismissing gesture. "It's fine, don't worry about it."

Rinoa smiled and looked at Namine and Kairi.

"Well, let's go then!"

"Where exactly are we going?" Kairi asked.

"Over by the castle," Aerith said. "It doesn't matter how many rounds we do, there are _always _Heartless there."

"It's great for training," Zack said, continuing his squats.

"Which is precisely what this is," Rinoa said.

"To the castle, then!" Kairi said.

"You sound like Sora when you say that," Leon mused.

Kairi cocked her head to one side.

"Sora has a habit of announcing where he's going."

"Oh."

Namine laughed.

"We're wasting daylight," Aerith said. "Let's go."

Rinoa laughed. "At this rate, we'll just be in charge of the next rounds."

"Don't," Cloud said. "Yuffie needs to take up responsibility again. She's gotten lazy with the excess of people here."

"She won't be slacking today," Leon said. "I'm party leader."

"You might need to find a new third if I'm not back in time," Aerith said, frowning.

"I'll go over to Merlin's and grab Quistis, if that's the case," Leon said. "She works better with Yuffie than Zell does."

"Where _is _Zell, anyway?" Rinoa asked.

"Back yard," Leon said, jerking a thumb in that direction. "He's practicing."

Neither Kairi nor Namine thought to ask what "practicing" entailed. Mostly because no one else seemed to wonder; so the girls figured this was normal.

"You sure it's okay if I'm not on this round?" Aerith asked.

"Yuffie needs to learn how to work well with everyone," Leon said. "And those two girls will need help with their Limit."

Aerith acknowledged those statements and went for the door, grabbing her staff on the way. Kairi and Namine followed her. Rinoa brought up the rear, but only after giving Leon a quick kiss on the forehead.

"So, does Yuffie not like doing rounds or something?" Kairi asked when they walked outside.

"Yuffie only likes rounds when she can steal a lot of munny from the Heartless," Rinoa said, taking a moment to stretch out her wings.

"Steal Materia can be hit and miss," Aerith added. "So it doesn't always work."

"That, and Yuffie doesn't work well with other people," Rinoa added. "She can't work with Zell or Cid at all."

"Part of it is her age," Aerith said. "She's old enough to take care of herself and be an adult—but she's still several years younger than the rest of us."

"Ah," Kairi said, understanding.

"So, what do we do when we run into enemies?" Namine asked.

"You show us the Limit that you're talking about," Rinoa said.

"We'll fight too," Aerith said. "So don't worry about taking on every single Heartless."

To help emphasize that point, Rinoa's blaster edge clicked into place.

"We're here both to back you up and ensure that you don't strain yourselves," Aerith continued.

"There is so much magic buzzing between us," Rinoa said, breathing in deeply. "It's nice."

"You can smell magic?" Kairi asked.

"Riku can smell darkness," Namine pointed out.

Rinoa still nodded. "It's part of being a Sorceress, I suppose. Well, when it comes to me smelling magic. I don't know why Riku can smell darkness."

"It has something to do with all he's been through," Aerith said. "I'm sure Cloud can do the same thing."

By that point, they had reached the edges of the castle.

"It looks so barren," Kairi said.

"As soon as we can get the Heartless better under control, we'll begin rebuilding it," Aerith said. "But for now, we need to focus on the town—that's where all the people are."

"The last person to live here was Xehanort," Namine said. "That can't be helping."

"Well, at least Maleficent won't be returning," Kairi added.

Oddly enough, at the mention of Maleficent's name, Heartless appeared. Like the ones Zack had been talking about earlier, all of these were Pureblood. Shadows and Neoshadows, Darkballs and Possessors; slick black creatures with bright yellow eyes. No Emblem in sight. Kairi drew her Keyblade out of habit.

"Well," Aerith said, readying her staff. "Show us what you've got."

"Do you think it will still work?" Namine asked, looking at Kairi uncertainly. "I remember being angry last time. Angry and a little bit more scared."

"Limits should work under just about any condition," Aerith said, keeping a perfect circle around her clear of Heartless with a spell that she didn't even appear to be saying out loud. "However, if you want, you two can wait until we're farther into this round when you're more tired. Limits tend to work better under stress."

"Or I could cast Aura," Rinoa suggested, sending her blaster edge at a nearby Neoshadow. "We don't know how long these Heartless are going to last."

Aerith shrugged.

Kairi bashed a Darkball that was going for Namine. It didn't die at first, so she had to bash it again. Namine was tempted to start shattering Heartless, it would certainly make her more tired and increase the chances of the Limit working. But at the same time, she didn't want to kill all the Heartless around and nullify the need for a Limit at all.

Rinoa went ahead and double-cast Aura on both girls.

Kairi and Namine felt the surge of power; both girls even glowed a golden color from the spell. Kairi looked at Namine, a glint in her eye.

"We can do this," she said. "Ready?"

Namine reached her hand out for Kairi to take.

"Ready."

The two girls once again threw their arms into the air.


	35. Critical Drive

**Author's Note: **Welp, rar had a posting spree. Now I'm desperately behind her. Like, she's posted further than I've written. However, at this point, it kinda doesn't matter because all of this is happening AROUND the same time. Ish. And plus, both of us are taking that happy hiatus to catch up on writing, so if we're good enough, we'll be able to get ourselves back on track with each other before we start posting again. Ugh, timeline stuff.

In other news, enjoy epic-combo chapter!

* * *

><p>"I'm not saying Zack has to leave!"<p>

xx

Kairi and Namine were surrounded with light instantly. The bubble of it that burst out even killed the nearby dozen or so Heartless. Rinoa and Aerith both squinted, but did their best to see the full Limit.

Just like before, when the light faded, only Kairi stood there. She wore the same elaborate pink and white dress she had worn the last time. Destiny's Embrace glowed white once again with power. When she opened her glowing white eyes, Rinoa made an understanding noise. She knew what caused that. The increase of power and magic in the area. Her own eyes did that when she performed more powerful magic—typically teleports.

She could smell the power and the magic that now permeated the area. She could _feel _it, it was so strong. Those two girls could put out a lot of power. And they only had the slightest inkling of how to control it. Rinoa herself only had a couple of ideas. However, so far there didn't seem to be any slips in control. Though, the Limit had just started.

Kairi raised her left hand and summoned the unnamed light forms and sent them forward. The light forms began attacking the Heartless. Silvery light glowed in every single place where a light form met the pure-blooded Heartless. Unable to help herself, Rinoa thrust out her wings and took flight to get an aerial view of the battlefield.

Aerith studied the interactions between the light and the darkness intently, trying to glean every single bit of information that she could so that she could give construction to the girls. This was easily the most amount of light she had seen come out of two people. Kairi and Namine packed a lot of power when put together.

Not even paying attention to anyone else on the battlefield anymore, Kairi only focused on the Heartless. After a minute or so, she raised her Keyblade into the air. The falcon and the owl appeared and started attacking the largest of the Heartless.

Aerith's attention was immediately drawn to the two birds. She tried to understand the meaning of them. Rinoa, meanwhile, was frowning at something else.

"We've got more Heartless," she called. "They're coming for the Keyblade."

Aerith started fighting, though she still tried to keep an eye on Kairi as she did so. Rinoa sent a tornado's worth of Aeroga at the new-coming set of Heartless. The unnamed light forms and the two birds continued to fight without faltering. There was a three foot radius around Kairi that was kept completely clear without her trying. It was as if the light radiating from her was keeping the Heartless at bay. However, they were now grouping around her, trying to get at her and her Keyblade, and banish the light while they were at it.

The two birds doubled back to pick off the Heartless that were surrounding Kairi and Namine. The unnamed light forms continued their march forward, taking out whatever Heartless reached their path. However, in some cases, three or four larger Heartless would gang up on a light form and it would be consumed in a flash of silvery-black.

_We need to do something! Look at all the Heartless!_

_Do you think I can't see them?_

_Can you summon the lion again?_

_We had to bring the birds back before I could summon the lion last time…_

_Try and summon the lion… That was all you last time._

Kairi tried. Nothing happened.

_We may just have to bring the birds back._

_Lamesauce._

Kairi laughed internally.

_What?_

_The fact that you just said 'lamesauce.'_

_You say 'drat'! Now let's focus on the Heartless!_

Kairi called back the falcon and Namine called back the owl. The two light forms were absorbed back into the Keyblade. Kairi tried once again to summon the lion. Still nothing.

_Can you summon anything?_

Namine pursed her lips (well, metaphorically) and concentrated on summoning another light form. She had the same luck as Kairi: nothing.

_What's happening? How did you summon the lion last time?_

_It just happened! I don't know…_

About then, the other light forms began dwindling.

_Maybe we don't have enough power…_

The light dimmed. The light forms disappeared altogether, the invisible wall around Kairi vanished as well. The Heartless broke through, already starting to attack.

Namine was ready with an ether. She tossed it up in the air for her and Kairi. Simultaneously, Aerith threw up an ether for the two of them.

"Really?" Namine asked, laughing. "Poor timing."

"Sorry!" Aerith apologized.

They didn't have much time for any more conversation, because the Heartless were increasing. Namine shattered a good portion of them, Kairi took out some more with her Keyblade. Rinoa continued pelting them with whatever magic struck her fancy. Aerith was taking out the ones that got close enough to her with her staff.

The Heartless just continued to come. Namine paced herself with shattering, knowing that she didn't want any negative side-effects. Kairi continued to work her way through any Heartless that came near her with her Keyblade. Rinoa frowned, not liking the looks of all the new Heartless. They were drawn both to the Keyblade and the large amount of light that had been here just moments before. Aerith took a moment to Cure everyone, unsure of what everyone's statuses were like.

"There's flying ones!" Rinoa shouted, shocked.

Still just as pure-blooded as the previous ones, but as Rinoa said, these ones flew. They didn't even seem to want to bother with the Keyblade. They went straight for Rinoa—possibly because she was arguably the current strongest power there. Or because she was flying like they were.

"Smart little Heartless," Rinoa muttered, sending her blaster edge at them.

They latched onto her wings, trying to drag her down. Namine cleared herself a path between herself and Rinoa. Then she started shattering the Heartless going directly after the flying Sorceress. It was hard though, because every time she shattered one, two more seemed to take its place. They were going after Rinoa like birds of prey.

Kairi was currently having problems with a few Massive Possessors. Aerith was dealing with a large amount of Neoshadows.

"We may need to do another limit of sorts!" Kairi shouted.

Namine frowned, knowing they didn't have the power for the one they had just pulled. Not unless they could be pushed to the limit…literally…

It was feasible.

Rinoa screamed. A white aura was surrounding her—but not consistently. It was shaky, as if the power behind it had a short somewhere. She coughed and spluttered and made another effort to shake the Heartless off—still in midflight.

Kairi ran up to Namine. They were about to join hands when a blast of energy knocked the Heartless back—killing them all instantly.

"Blasting Zone…" Rinoa whispered.

Kairi and Namine turned to see a rather angry-looking Leon standing about ten feet away from them. He had been the one to send the blast of energy.

Rinoa coughed again and started to land, coming down slowly next to Leon. He reached out his arms to grab a hold of her.

Yuffie's shuriken spiraled over Kairi and Namine's heads. It took out the Neoshadows that were surrounding Aerith before boomeranging back to her. Aerith bent down and scooped up the munny that had been dropped. Yuffie bounded over and Aerith handed her the munny.

"Thanks!" Yuffie exclaimed.

"You're welcome," Aerith replied.

Kairi had to figure that if it was anyone else picking up the munny, Yuffie would have thrown a fit. However, since it was Aerith…

"Are we clear to get rid of them, or are we still practicing?" Quistis yelled out, snapping her whip expectantly.

Aerith took one look at Rinoa, who still appeared to be recovering from the Heartless swamping her.

"Let's clear up," she told Quistis.

Quistis gave a curt nod and started summoning Quetzalcoatl.

"Is this too small an area to summon Bahamut?" Yuffie asked.

Aerith frowned for a moment, thinking. Then she nodded.

Yuffie shrugged and just sent her shuriken out again.

"Are you okay?" Leon asked, holding Rinoa close to him.

She coughed, shook her head. Coughed again, shook her head to clear it, and then nodded.

"It's just…when they get a hold of you…" she began.

"It's like they drain everything from you," Namine finished. "Your energy, your drive, your magic…"

Rinoa nodded.

"Here," Namine said, fishing in her pocket. "I think I've got another ether."

"No need," Leon said, pointing at Aerith.

Aerith had knelt down to the ground, starting a Limit of her own. Blue sparks began to surround everyone who was even the slightest bit injured. Unsurprisingly, Rinoa was covered with the most sparks. They both healed everyone and restored magic.

When the sparks had died down, Aerith stood back up and readied her staff for more Heartless. Quetzalcoatl had taken care of quite a few; and Yuffie's attempts to get more munny had blown through several more. Namine paused for a moment and shattered half a dozen Heartless to help matters. Kairi readied her Keyblade.

"If you want to continue what it is you set out to do, the three of us can handle this," Quistis said.

Leon looked at Rinoa.

"Well, we did promise Kairi and Namine that we'd help," she said. "And I'm doing a poor job of it."

Leon looked like he was going to argue, but before he could, Namine beat him to it.

"It's not your fault that the Heartless got to you."

"Namine's right," Kairi added. "It could have happened to any of us."

"If you wouldn't mind just finishing up here," Aerith said, looking between Leon and Quistis. "Then Rinoa and I can discuss with Namine and Kairi what we think of their Limit."

"Sure thing," Quistis said, casually snapping her whip at a Shadow that dared to get too close. "It's part of the job, isn't it?"

Leon nodded. Yuffie wasn't even paying attention. She was too busy taking down Neoshadows. They were dropping a lot of munny, so she was content.

"I think that sounds like a good plan, then," Rinoa said, squeezing Leon's arm. "You take care of yourself, now."

"Same to you," he muttered.

She kissed him on the forehead. "Of course I will, silly."

He made a face, but didn't seem to mind all that much about the nickname.

"Let's head into the town," Aerith said, pointing in that direction with her staff. "That should be far enough away from where the Heartless are coming from."

Kairi and Namine nodded and started following after Aerith. Rinoa brought up the rear.

"Banish your Keyblade," Rinoa said. "It will only encourage them to follow."

"Then what's the point of having it then?" Kairi asked, looking back at the battle scene they had just left. Leon, Yuffie and Quistis were all busy with Heartless extermination.

"The Keyblade is a very useful weapon when it comes to fighting Heartless," Aerith said. "However, right now there are too many Heartless for that one Keyblade."

"Sora fought a thousand of them once, by himself," Kairi argued.

"That was a Heartless infestation caused by the Organization," Aerith explained. "This… this is…"

"An imbalance," Rinoa finished. "Hollow Bastion has been plunged into darkness too many times."

Kairi and Namine winced; Aerith merely nodded in agreement.

"Plus, all those Heartless are attracted to the fact that we have a lot of fighters in one place."

Aerith frowned.

"I'm not saying Zack needs to leave!" Rinoa said quickly. "Unfortunately, we've gotten ourselves on a slippery slope: Hollow Bastion had a lot of Heartless, we bring in some more fighters to fight the Heartless, more Heartless show up because they're attracted to the increase of power and strong hearts… but still no one has to leave."

Aerith breathed out a visible sigh of relief.

"Besides," Rinoa continued. "Quistis won't be staying much longer. Only for another month or so. She has a job to return to. Zell will probably go with her since he has no ties here. If anyone is going to leave right now, it will be me and Squall—we'll go somewhere."

The last thought was added rather wistfully.

Aerith sighed. "I was so excited when Cloud and Tifa decided to stay—since he travels so much, it was nice to see them. And I'm not saying you guys are a crowd either. And with Zack… well… I couldn't say no. I can't turn anyone away! Much less him. No one should have to leave because I don't have room. You and Leon don't have to…"

"We may want to."

Namine had the growing realization that she could see her house operating in a fashion similar to Aerith's—someday, that is. But it certainly seemed like a possibility—all of them traveling about and stuff, but with one constant place that they could go home to.

"We just have to find a balance," Rinoa continued, not giving anyone the chance to think about what she meant by saying she and Leon would want to go somewhere else. "We need to see what's causing all this darkness. I doubt it's a matter of expulsion anymore."


	36. Friends

**Author's Note: **So this one's a TAD shorter than usual. Only by a couple-hundred words or so. But, it is shorter, so I feel like mentioning it. However, you also get two different scenes and a ton of stuff! Woohoo!

* * *

><p>"He got better."<p>

xx

The four of them reached the town. Aerith led them to a little outdoor café and they all sat down. A couple of small children looked at Rinoa's wings with awe, but no one really said anything about it. Apparently, such things were rather normal in Hollow Bastion.

"So, what does all this have to do with my Keyblade?" Kairi asked.

"Arguably, it has everything to do with your Keyblade," Aerith said.

"Well, not the part about all the fighters living here," Rinoa said apologetically. "That was just me babbling."

"But most of this stuff comes down to your Keyblade—all Keyblades. The Worlds have just now started seeing them again. For so long they went without them and things fell out of balance. Now they're trying to right themselves again and you get stuff like _this_."

Rinoa gestured to the area they had just left.

"So, it's basically Xehanort's fault," Namine declared, her fingers itching for her sketchbook, but she didn't want to mess with pulling it out of her bag.

Aerith and Rinoa nodded in response to her question.

"Does that answer your question about your Keyblade, though?" Aerith asked.

Kairi nodded.

"Shall we talk about the Limit, then?" Rinoa asked, clasping her hands together in expectation.

The other girls nodded.

"So how do you two feel about the Limit," Aerith asked. "Let's start there."

"It's rather effective," Namine said. "Both on people and on Heartless."

"We've only done the Limit twice," Kairi added. "I'm pretty comfortable with it for the most part. I just want to see if there's any improving to be done. And to know why we couldn't summon the lion like we did last time…"

"Lion?" Rinoa asked.

Before Kairi or Namine could answer, Aerith asked another question:

"Who else was in your party that last time?"

"Sora," Kairi and Namine answered simultaneously.

Aerith made an understanding noise.

"I'm not following," Rinoa said.

Aerith pointed at Kairi. "Falcon." She pointed at Namine. "Owl. Do you follow now?"

Rinoa's eyes went wide. "Oh! That's good! And that would make Sora the…"

"Lion," Aerith said. "Fitting, isn't it?"

Rinoa nodded.

"So each of us has a personalized light form of sorts?" Namine asked, pulling her sketchbook out of her bag anyway.

"It would appear so," Aerith said. "The Light from your Limit takes on personifications of the people in your party in the form of animals."

"So that's why I couldn't summon the lion," Kairi said.

"But why couldn't we summon a light form for either of you, then?" Namine asked, looking up briefly to ask this question before returning to her sketch of two birds.

"Your hearts are not nearly as connected to ours as they are to Sora's," Rinoa answered. "Try and see what you can come up with fighting alongside Riku or Xion sometime."

"Any other ideas for improving?" Kairi asked.

"Practice," Aerith replied. "Just don't overexert yourself. And keep the Limit to a final resort as well, like Limits should be."

Kari and Namine nodded in understanding.

"Light is a very powerful form of magic," Rinoa said. "It's not like Fire or Blizzard or Thunder. It's powerful white magic. You'll have to learn how to keep a handle on it, for even light can get out of hand."

"Don't use that Limit when it's just the two of you," Aerith added. "Just in case something does happen."

Kairi and Namine nodded again.

"You look daunted," Aerith said. "Are we unloading too much on you?"

"No," Namine said quickly. She had finished drawing the birds by now.

"Just processing," Kairi said. "That's all."

"Making magic carries a lot of responsibility," Aerith said. "Especially when it's more powerful magic."

There was a brief moment of silence as the profoundness of Aerith's words sunk in. Namine even paused in her drawing.

"Who taught you that?" she asked.

Aerith smiled. "It was a mouse," she said. "Before he was king."

Namine and Kairi exchanged glances.

_King Mickey?_

_Sounds like…_

_I can't imagine him not being King…_

_Well, he can't always have been King…_

_I wonder how long Aerith's known him…_

_Mickey knows everyone, it seems._

_Yeah, so does Aerith…_

If Aerith or Rinoa noticed the silent conversation going on between Kairi and Namine, they didn't mention anything about it. Namine flipped to another page in her sketchbook and started drawing out the King. She thought that maybe she could trigger a scene with him and Aerith, though she wasn't sure if she could go that far back in the past—especially with two hearts that she wasn't all that connected with.

"I think we should teach them Holy," Aerith said, rather suddenly. "They've already demonstrated that they have the capacity to handle it."

Rinoa looked at Kairi and Namine. Namine looked up from the image, she only had the King finished. Kairi, who had just been sitting there quietly, cocked her head expectantly.

"Sure, why not?" Rinoa said.

"How do you teach something like that?" Namine asked, erasing one of the King's ears in an attempt to fix it. "Holy is huge magic."

"And what did the two of you just do with Light?" Rinoa replied, raising an eyebrow.

"But we weren't even thinking about it," Kairi said. "It just happened."

"So will Holy," Aerith replied. "You just have to control it."

"Well, when can we start learning, then?" Kairi asked. "Or practicing, or whatever it is that it's actually called."

"We can start tonight," Aerith said. "Or tomorrow morning. If you two don't mind staying overnight, that is."

"Do we have enough beds?" Rinoa asked. "I don't think we have any spares."

"Drat, I always forget," Aerith muttered. "Well, I'll sleep on a couch. Tifa would probably…"

"We can sleep on the couches," Namine said, finally satisfied with the King's ear. "It's really no big deal."

"If you don't mind…" Rinoa said.

Kairi and Namine shook their heads.

"I need to build another room onto the house," Aerith mused.

That got them all laughing.

xx

"So many Heartless!" Xion grunted, slicing her Keyblade through several Possessors. "Have we not sealed this Keyhole yet? Because this isn't the first time one of us has had to come here and deal with them here."

"No, I sealed this one myself," Sora replied, jumping up and gliding over to one of the Avalanches that was flying about. "It seems as though the Heartless are just content to settle for people's hearts since they can't get to the World's hearts."

"Pity, I was hoping that the Heartless would just go away."

"It's not as bad as it used to be."

He landed back on the ground, taking out the last few Possessors as he went.

"Not even close," he continued, performing a bit of a victory swipe.

"I feel like I have memory of that," Xion mused.

Sora laughed. "Probably. Hey, I think there's some more over there."

Using his Keyblade, he pointed to an area by some trees where it literally looked like Heartless were waiting for them. Xion nodded and the two of them hurried over.

"This isn't even as bad as Hollow Bastion, now that I think about it," Xion said, taking out a Scarlet Tango. "They have to deal with hordes of Heartless of this magnitude every day. We've only been coming here every few days or so."

"I've sealed Hollow Bastion's Keyhole too, though," Sora muttered, frowning.

Xion shrugged. "Hollow Bastion has problems."

"You could say that again."

They grew silent for a few minutes as they continued to deal with the Heartless. Most of them were pure blood, though there were the occasional Emblems. They had noticed over the past week or so that the Emblem ones were disappearing over all the worlds. Riku had mentioned at one point that this was probably because the Emblem Heartless had been manufactured and it was coming to a point that there just weren't many left.

"I do wish we could be done with this though, right here," Xion said. "After all those Possessors, I've got enough munny for, like, six ice creams. I could go to Twilight Town with Roxas. I think he said he was just going to laze on the beach all day today."

Sora laughed. "Well, I could try for a Drive Form," he said. "Maybe that would take care of the last of them."

"Sure, go for it," Xion said. "But do you have any left?"

"I've got one," Sora said, lowering his Keyblade slightly as he concentrated his power.

He felt a bit of darkness flare up and he knew that he was getting close to triggering Anti-Form. He would have to go into Final Form before he tried Driving again after this. It wouldn't be any harder going enemy-bashing with Roxas than it was Xion. But he needed to trigger Final Form to bat away the darkness.

Thankfully, he didn't trigger Anti-Form. Instead, he triggered a form he hardly ever used: Limit. It had been a while since he had used this form. The last time he had, he'd been with Donald and Goofy. How long ago that had been…

Xion had disappeared. Her Keyblade now rest in Sora's right hand, Oathkeeper was still in his left.

"Well, well," Sora said, looking down at the two Keyblades. "This is new."

He took a moment to look himself over. He was, indeed, in Limit Form. They only differences were the newly-acquired ability to dual-wield and the disappearance of Xion. Shrugging this all off, he launched into Sonic Blade. He knew that attack would work to effectively wipe out all (or at least almost all) of the remaining Heartless in the area. And that's what Xion wanted to happen because she wanted to go home.

He didn't blame her, he wanted to see Kairi—but she was out learning how to control powerful magic. He couldn't stop that.

Even though he was slightly distracted by thinking about Kairi, he managed to get all of the Heartless. He nodded in satisfaction at the lack of the yellow-eyed monsters. He phased out of Limit Form, seeing no need to keep it up. Xion's Keyblade disappeared out of his hand and reappeared in her hand as she came back.

"That's that," Sora said, banishing his Keyblade and dusting off his hands.

"Well then," Xion mused. "That was quick."

"Sonic Blade. Pretty sweet attack," Sora said. "When it comes to slicing attacks like that, it's pretty much second only to Dark Aura."

"That one's one of Riku's specialties, isn't it?" Xion asked.

Sora nodded, though he winced a bit too.

Xion laughed.

"It's not funny," Sora said.

"What, because you were on the receiving end?"

"No, because Riku wasn't himself…"

Xion stopped. "Oh."

They were silent for a moment.

"He got better," Xion said quietly.

Sora nodded. "Yeah, he did."

There was another small bit of silence.

"Well, I'm glad I can be useful in triggering a Drive Form," Xion said. "I wasn't sure if there was anything in that regards that I could help you with."

Sora smiled crookedly at her. "It's not like I'd like you any less if you couldn't. You're an awesome friend."

Xion smiled. "Thanks."

Sora smiled too. "We should go, though," he said. "Before any more Heartless show up. I don't want that Sonic Blade to go to waste."

Xion laughed. "Yes, let's head out. I want my ice cream."

Sora laughed as well. He dug his hand into his pocket, reaching for the star shard. He offered his other hand out to Xion and she took it.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Yes," Xion replied.

He activated the star shard.


	37. The Heart that Fought Back

**Author's Note: **I'm too tired for an author's note. Enjoy the chapter :)

* * *

><p>"Let's get some ice cream!"<p>

xx

King Mickey sat at his desk, his hands folded neatly out in front of him. He looked very business-like, almost. Across the desk from him, stood Aqua, Terra and Ven. Terra and Aqua stood very rigid-like. Ven was slouching, much to Aqua's chagrin. Mickey didn't seem to care though, that Ven was slouching.

"I really must thank you for coming and helping with that Castle Thorn on such short notice," he said with a little bit of a laugh. He looked from Terra to Aqua to Ven, smiling.

"No problem, sir," Ven said, putting his arms behind his head. "I mean, it's part of our job, anyway."

Mickey nodded. "I just know that you three are busy with another task."

"We were close by when you called," Aqua said. "It was nothing to drop by."

"What was that thing, anyway?" Terra asked. "What did you call it? A Castle Thorn?"

Mickey nodded. "Thorns are a large type of Nobody."

"What's a Nobody doing here?" Aqua asked, frowning.

"Thorns typically appear as a World's attempt to put itself back into balance," Mickey explained. "It happens very frequently in Worlds that lie between light and darkness."

"I doubt this World counts as being in between light and darkness," Terra said.

"It isn't," Mickey said. "But it's been through some balance struggles."

The King flinched as he said this. Almost as if he blamed himself for the imbalance. Perhaps he did.

"That Thorn should be the last of it," he continued, now looking relieved.

"Well, you let us know if you've got any more trouble," Ven said.

Mickey smiled. "Aw, shucks. Thanks, guys."

"No problem."

"Of course!"

"Sure thing!"

"Is there anything else we can help you with?" Aqua asked.

The King shook his head. "If there was, we would have heard about it by now. Goofy is very vigilant." He said this with a laugh. "However, if you three have a moment, I would like to hear about your adventures."

"We've sealed two Keyholes," Ven said. "One in the Dwarf Woodlands and one out in Deep Space."

"The one in Dwarf Woodlands wasn't too hard to find," Terra said. "One of the dwarves led us right to it."

"Then it was just a matter of fighting all the Heartless," Ven added.

"And protecting the Princess," Aqua continued.

"She's safe, though?" Mickey asked.

The other three nodded.

"The Deep Space Keyhole was much more difficult to find," Terra said. "Luckily Aqua stumbled down the wrong corridor."

"More like the right corridor," Aqua teased.

"Still, it took forever," Ven grumbled.

"No matter," Aqua said. "It's sealed now."

"Axel and Xion covered the one in Enchanted Dominion," Ven said. "They came across it by accident."

The look on Mickey's face clearly questioned the bit about a Keyblade Wielder coming across a Keyhole by accident part.

"Well," he said. "It sounds like the mission is getting along well. Where do you plan to go next?"

"Well," Aqua said. "We haven't been to Castle of Dreams yet. Though we were thinking of heading to Twilight Town or The World that Never Was, since they're closer to the darkness."

"No need to worry about The World that Never Was," Mickey said. "I sealed that one myself."

"Which explains why Sora didn't mention it," Ven mused.

"Twilight Town sounds like a good place to go next," Mickey said. "Though, I warn you, Master Yen Sid hasn't been able to locate it so far. You may have some trouble finding it."

"I still think that we can find it," Ven said. "It'll be a fun challenge."

Mickey nodded. "Sounds like you have your work cut out for you."

Terra, Aqua and Ven all agreed.

"How goes your Master training?" Mickey asked.

"Both Terra and Ven are doing wonderfully," Aqua replied.

Mickey smiled. "Excellent!"

Ven grinned. Terra smiled too, though his was more subtle.

Mickey looked directly at Terra. "Are you still concerned about the darkness rearing up inside of your heart?'

Terra's eyes widened. He hadn't really been expecting to be asked that question. Especially from the King.

He summoned his Keyblade to examine it. It was almost as if the darkness in his heart and his Keyblade were linked. Technically, they were, even outside of his own thought process. The cracks had decreased significantly since the day he had gotten it back several weeks ago.

He studied his Keyblade intently for a few moments before looking up at King Mickey.

"Not as much as before," he said finally. "When I'm fighting enemies, I don't have to try as hard to keep the darkness in check. It's still there, but I don't have to fight it, too."

"That's swell!" Mickey exclaimed. "It's really swell that you've been working on this."

"It's not just from just my own doing," Terra said, giving a little shake of his head. "Master Eraqus has helped."

"Ah yes," Mickey said, sitting back in his seat. "A small portion of Master Eraqus' heart resides in you."

Terra nodded.

"I feel that it's the least I could do, after everything," he said quietly.

"What's the least you could do?" Ven asked.

"Offer him a place to stay," Terra said, his hand hovering over his heart. "However, I can feel the presence fading." He looked up at Mickey, eyes questioning. "Why is that?"

"Over time," Mickey said. "It's very likely that Eraqus' heart is just fading."

"Is that bad?" Terra asked.

King Mickey shook his head. "No, just a part of life."

"It's good though," Aqua said. "That he offered out his light in order to help you. Master Eraqus did always treat you like the son he never had."

Terra smiled at this. "Yeah, yeah he did."

This actually, got everyone in the whole room smiling.

Before anything else could be said or discussed, there was a knock on the door.

"Come in," Mickey said.

Lady Daisy made her way in.

"Your Majesty," she said, giving a little nod in Mickey's direction.

"Yes, Lady Daisy?" Mickey asked.

"There's a matter of importance that requires your attention," she said, clasping her hands in front of her.

"May I ask what it is? Provided our fellow friends can learn of this as well," Mickey replied, gesturing to Terra, Aqua and Ven.

"The fairies are here," Daisy replied. "Queen Minnie is currently seeing them in the Audience Chamber."

"Fairies?" Ven asked, cocking his head to one side.

"His Majesty called all the fairies from across the worlds to come and meet here so we could figure out more ways to keep the darkness from spreading across the worlds," Lady Daisy explained.

"Is everyone here?" Mickey asked.

"We're just missing Tinker Bell," Lady Daisy said with a shrug. "Though, she is a pixie…"

"Don't belittle her," Mickey warned. "You may just regret it. Have any of the other mystics and sorcerers shown up?"

"Rafiki's here," Daisy replied. "But no one else."

"Merlin will probably be late," Mickey mused. "And Master Yen Sid will come on his own time…"

"Can we come?" Ven asked. "I mean, isn't keeping the darkness from spreading our job too?"

"Ven," Aqua said. "We already have our part in this job. King Mickey is meeting with people who have a different skill-set than we do."

"Gawsh, I told you that you can leave out the 'king'," Mickey said, looking rather embarrassed.

Aqua smiled. "I know that, sir. But consider it my form of respect. Sort of like how we refer to Master Yen Sid as just that—Master; despite him being a retired Wielder."

Mickey nodded at her. "I see your point."

"He's meeting with people who are good with magic, right?" Terra asked. "Then why don't you go, Aqua?"

Aqua's face flushed red and she looked down at her shoes. "I may be good with magic, but I'm not anywhere near the level of a mystic or a mage."

"Nonsense," Mickey said. "You've undoubtedly improved greatly in your magic-casting."

"I feel that my place is here," Aqua said. "With my Keyblade and training them to become Masters."

"And that is perfectly honorable," Mickey said with a nod. "If you feel a calling to something, no one can stop you—except yourself, that is."

Aqua smiled.

"So are we going to go off to Twilight Town, then?" Ven asked.

Aqua nodded. She turned to Mickey. "You'll keep us posted on what's going on, won't you?"

"Of course!" Mickey exclaimed. "You let us know here what's going on with you guys on your side of this mission."

"Yes, sir!" Terra said, nodding.

"Naturally," Aqua said with a smile.

"You got it!" Ven said, grinning.

Mickey smiled and nodded at them. "Well, in that case, you guys head off and do your part and I'll do mine."

Terra, Aqua and Ven turned to leave. They all nodded and waved at Lady Daisy as they walked out of the room. She nodded back at them and almost subconsciously gestured them towards the door.

"So what do you suppose all the fairies and mages are going to do about the darkness?" Ven asked as they walked down the hallway.

"I don't know," Aqua said.

"They may not even know yet," Terra added.

"We'll just have to wait and see," Aqua said. "But I'm sure we'll find out when it happens."

Ven sighed. "But I want to know now," he muttered.

Aqua and Terra looked at each other and laughed.

"What?" Ven asked.

"Patience, Ven," Terra said.

Ven sighed.

"To Twilight Town, then?" Aqua said, trying to channel Ven's want to go to the fairy meeting into something productive.

"Sure," Terra said, going along with it.

"Can we get ice cream there?" Ven asked.

Aqua and Terra laughed again.

"Sure," Aqua said, still giggling a little. "But what's so special about ice cream there?"

"Axel said it was the best," Ven replied with a shrug. "And there's something… almost familiar about the feeling of getting ice cream there."

"Well, then let's go get ice cream there," Terra said. "We'll be wandering around the place anyway searching for the Keyhole."

"I see nothing wrong with the plan," Aqua said.

By this point, they had reached the gardens, which is where they had arrived when they had used the star shard to get there. Out of habit, they had gone back there in order to leave.

"Have a magical day!" Goofy yelled from across the courtyard.

Ven, Aqua and Terra looked over to see him waving excitingly at them. They all waved back. Goofy grinned.

"See you another day!" he said.

"Of course!"

"You betcha!"

"See you another time!"

Aqua pulled out the star shard and linked arms with Terra and Ven. With Goofy still waving at them, a giant grin on his face, she activated it.

The three of them appeared off in a little alcove out of the way of everything else going on on Market Street.

"Let's get some ice cream!" Aqua declared.


	38. The Underworld

**Author's Note:** Just in case the comments on the last blog post weren't read, I'm not actually discontinuing Betwixt and Between. It was an April Fool's joke. It turned out to be a rather poor one, but it was a joke nonetheless. I am still continuing and I think the following chapter proves that. :) Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"What did you do to her?"<p>

xx

Kairi and Namine were in Aerith's backyard, sparring with a couple of wooden swords that Aerith had lying around. (Or, perhaps it was Leon or Zack that just randomly had a couple of wooden swords lying about.) Regardless, the two of them were sparring.

Kairi moved with fluidity and ease, Namine spent most of her time blocking.

"I don't think sparring's really my thing," Namine said, backing up so Kairi couldn't reach her. "And I think I've already known this fact for a while."

Kairi lowered her sword to the side, Namine's was still up in a defensive position. Kairi looked thoughtful. Namine looked worried that she was going to get hit, even though Kairi wasn't going to do anything.

"You know," Kairi mused. "With the way you're jabbing that sword around, you'd think you were better fit for a dagger."

Namine shrugged in a "how-should-I-know" manner.

"We should look into getting you one," Kairi mused. "It would certainly come in handy—and that way you don't have to keep using pencils."

Namine frowned. "I only do that when the Heartless get too close."

Kairi raised an eyebrow. "That happened twice last night. And you never did get your orange pencil back."

Namine shrugged. "I don't really need orange. Not as much as the other colors…"

"We should ask around about a dagger though," Kairi said. "I'm no good at determining what kind of knife is a good one."

"If you really think I should have one…"

"You should have _some _sort of physical weapon. Even Aerith and Rinoa have weapons outside of magic."

"I suppose you're right. Hey, speaking of Aerith…"

Aerith came out into the back yard, cradling something in her arms. She looked over at Kairi and Namine and smiled.

"How goes sparring?" she asked.

"I'm not very good," Namine said. "It's not my strong suit."

"I was thinking she'd do better off with a dagger," Kairi said, giving her input.

Aerith pondered this for a moment. "Definitely something worth looking into," she said. "Or at least some sort of physical weapon."

Kairi smiled, but she tried to keep the "I-told-you-so" look off her face. She liked to reserve that for Riku and Sora, mostly.

"However," Aerith continued. "Today, our focus is Holy."

She held out what was in her arms for Kairi and Namine to see. It was two glowing balls of light. They looked completely intangible, but at the same time, they had to have some substance to them, otherwise there would be no way for Aerith to hold them. They each seemed to have a thousand or more colors inside of them. They were beautiful-looking, yet also dangerous-looking.

Namine's eyes went wide. Kairi's did too, she even gasped a little.

"What…are those?" Kairi asked after a moment.

"Pure essence of Holy," Aerith replied. "By taking in these, you will gain the ability to cast Holy and all other forms of the spell at will. You won't need any other aid—nor will you be able to lose this ability, barring something really serious happening to you."

"Like what?" Namine asked.

"Oh, typically falling into darkness would do it. But there are other factors." Aerith was completely serious as she said this.

"Memory rewrites," Namine mumbled with a shudder.

Aerith made an agreeing noise, though it was quiet.

"At that point, however," she continued. "You have more problems at hand than the sudden inability to cast Holy."

"Can I touch them?" Kairi asked, still staring at the orbs of light.

Aerith nodded. "Of course. I'm holding them, aren't I? Besides, you'll need to pick them up so you can utilize them."

Not hesitating any further, Kairi and Namine reached for the two orbs of light and color. Their hands had barely touched the glowing objects when all the light was absorbed by the girls. Kairi and Namine themselves glowed with light for a few moments.

"There," Aerith said. "You've learned it. Now to practice!"

Rinoa poked her head out of the back door.

"Aerith," she said.

Aerith, Kairi and Namine all turned.

"Were we going to go to that meeting that the King called?"

"Meeting?" Aerith asked. "What meeting?"

"The meeting of the fairies and mages," Rinoa said. "Where we were going to try and figure out exactly what damage Xehanort has caused over the years and what we need to do about it."

Aerith thought about this for a moment. "Is the meeting today?"

Rinoa nodded. "Merlin reminded me of it when he left for it."

Aerith frowned. "I told the King we may not be able to make it, given how hectic it can be here."

Rinoa nodded in understanding.

"Well, it's not hectic now, however…"

She looked at Kairi and Namine.

"We did promise…"

"They have already learned the spell, they just need to practice," Aerith said.

Kairi and Namine were unsure of what to say. They didn't want to make Aerith or Rinoa miss this meeting because it sounded important, especially with the King calling it and all; but at the same time, they wanted to be instructed properly on how to use Holy.

Rinoa looked at their faces and made a quick decision.

"I have a solution," she said. "Aerith, you can stay here and help them with Holy. Quistis and I will head on over to Disney Castle. Unless, of course, you would rather go to the meeting. In which case, I can stay and help them. It's no matter to me."

"No, no, you go ahead," Aerith said. "It's no matter to me either. You said it wasn't hectic here?"

Rinoa shook her head. "All the rounds for the day are covered, too. Squall, Quistis and I just got back. Zack, Cloud and Yuffie have the next round. Cid's got a new cannon piece to test out at night, so he's got the evening shift with Zell and Tifa."

"Oh, am I not on the rotation for today?" Aerith asked. "I haven't even been paying attention."

"Yup, you're off today," Rinoa said.

Aerith nodded. "Well, you and Quistis go have fun. I'm probably going to take these two off-world for practice. I want to see if we can find a Thorn, or some sort of large Heartless for this."

Rinoa nodded in agreement. "Sounds like a plan." She brought her first finger up to her chin. "Give me a call when you're done, who knows, the meeting may still be going on." She shrugged. "I wouldn't know, I've never been to one of these before."

"Neither have I," Aerith admitted. "There hasn't been one in a while."

"Well, Xehanort's been around for a while," Rinoa said.

"I'll keep you posted," Aerith said. "I get the feeling the meeting will probably still be going on long after I've finished a good training session with these two. And I should probably go. King Mickey did call everyone for a reason."

Rinoa nodded and went back into the house.

"Let me guess, we probably weren't invited to the meeting?" Kairi mused.

"You would know if you had been," Aerith said. "He called people whose strongpoints are magic alone. You two don't really have a focus yet."

"Well, I have a Keyblade," Kairi said.

Aerith nodded. "But even as a Keyblade Wielder, you'll gain a focus in something."

"Shouldn't we go practice?" Namine asked. "That way Aerith can make it to this meeting."

"You make it sound like you're being bothers," Aerith said, smiling.

"Are we?" Namine asked.

"Nonsense," Aerith said, shaking her head. "I enjoy doing stuff like this."

"So where are we going to go?" Kairi asked.

"Olympus Coliseum, I would think," Aerith said, putting her forefinger on her chin as she thought about this. "There always seems to be quite the selection of monsters there."

"Sounds like a plan," Namine said, mimicking Rinoa's gesture of bringing her finger to her chin.

Kairi pulled the star shard out of her pocket. She looked at Aerith. "Star shard?" she asked. "Or did you want to do something different?"

"Star shards are fine," Aerith said.

Kairi nodded and the three of them linked arms.

xx

"Well, I didn't mean to go here," Kairi said as they looked at their new surroundings. "Wherever here is…"

"We appear to be in the Underworld," Aerith said. "I _feel _like we're in the Underworld."

"I feel it too," Kairi said. "Sora talked about this. Don't we need a Hero's Medallion or something?"

"Or to just get out of here," Namine said, looking around. "Kairi, haven't we been here before?"

Kairi's eyes lit up. "Oh yeah! Sora, Riku, Axel and I all came down here. I remember Sora taking off as soon as he had the Medallion. That's why I haven't ever felt this groggy before…"

Namine shivered from a draft. "Just use the star shard again and let's get out of here."

"It won't work," Aerith said.

"It won't?" Kairi asked.

Aerith shook her head. "Star shards don't work in the Underworld. The fact that we got in is actually really puzzling. There must be something direly important happening down here."

Kairi and Namine exchanged glances. They had been to completely different universes because of direly important things. What was going on now?

About then, they heard voices.

"I think it's time for a summer home, boys," came the unmistakable voice of Hades.

"What were you thinking of, Boss?" asked one of his minions, Pain.

Aerith, Namine and Kairi all looked around, trying to see where the voices were coming from. However, they were in a maze of tunnels and the voices seemed to be coming from practically all directions.

"I was thinking about this lovely place," Hades replied to his minion.

The girls all wished they could see whatever it was Hades was showing his minions, for he didn't say what the place actually was.

"Of course," Hades continued. "It'll need a little bit of remodeling and redecoration, but I think it will make an excellent summer home."

"Gee, Boss, it looks pretty swell," Panic said. "But how are you gonna get a place like that?"

"Easy, that's what these are for."

Once again, Kairi, Namine and Aerith couldn't see whatever it was Hades was pointing at. However, this time, the thing being pointed at made noise.

"Is that…" Namine whispered. "Dusks?"

For it sure sounded like Dusks.

"With these fancy-shmancy little things," Hades said, bravado seeping out of his voice. "Disney Castle and all of Disney Town will be ours!"

Pain and Panic applauded.

"We have to go warn the King," Aerith said.

"We have to get out of here," Namine said.

"Leaving so soon, ladies?" Hades asked.

The three of them turned. Hades was standing right behind them, a toothy smile on his face.

"I really wouldn't want you three to duck out so soon, you haven't even stayed for tea!"

"Run," Aerith whispered. "There's no point fighting him on his own ground, not without a Medallion. Our strength and magic is diminished beyond measure."

Kairi and Namine nodded, ever-so-small-like.

"Ready?" Aerith breathed.

Kairi and Namine took off running, Aerith did so as well. They did what they could to stay together. Aerith pulled ahead, trying to see if she could find a viable exit. However, just when they all thought they were going to get somewhere, Kairi let out a shriek.

Namine and Aerith turned, stopping dead in their tracks. Kairi had crumpled to the ground in pain. She held herself up by the elbows, but only barely. It didn't look like she was going to be able to get up, much less run any farther. She looked both exhausted and like she was in pain.

Instinctively, Namine threw up a Cure. But it didn't work. The spell fizzled out before Namine had even finished casting it. Kairi showed no signs of being affected, either. The Cure had been rendered completely useless. Aerith frowned and threw up a Curaga—to the same effect. It was useless.

Aerith's eyes went wide. Namine's narrowed into near-slits.

"What did you do to her?" she demanded, glaring daggers at Hades.


	39. Rage Awakened

**Author's Note: **Okay, last chapter before my official hiatus. I'm finally caught up with where rar is posting and hopefully we can start posting in-line with each other (when we're both pretty set ahead to post.) (Hopefully, though, she may take herself off hiatus... sigh...)

A little reminder: DO NOT POST SPOILERS FOR 3D. Please and thank you. I don't care if something I wrote is REALLY similar, I DON'T want to know.

Onto the chapter!

* * *

><p>"Hades has control over the Dusks, somehow."<p>

xx

If Kairi had been more conscious of what was going on around her, she probably would have feared for Hades' mental health. She knew that look. Namine had given it to Sora's Shadow that one time. Hades, however, didn't know what was coming to him if he didn't play nice.

"I just sapped all of her strength," Hades replied, keeping up the obnoxiously large grin. "It wasn't all that hard. Anyone who stays down here long enough starts to feel weak. Unless they're me. And none of you are me. So your strength might as well be mine."

He gave a cocky laugh.

"Why her?" Namine spat, unimpressed by his cocky show.

"She's the only one I recognized," Hades replied with a little flick of his hand. "She's a Keyblade brat." His eyes wandered from Namine to Aerith, deciding he wouldn't mention anything about Namine at all.

"A pretty girl dressed all in pink," he mused, looking Aerith up and down. "Hmm, I think I may have heard of you. A couple of knights have mentioned you over the years. Tell me, sweetheart, are you playing with them both, or did the dark-haired one die? I haven't seen him in a while."

Now Aerith's eyes narrowed.

"Why you over-confident-pitiful-excuse-for-a-Greek-god!" she swore. She summoned her staff. "Weak spell or no, you will pay for those words."

"Ah, ah, ah, ah, not here you won't," Hades said.

With another twiddling of fingers, Aerith crumpled to the ground, just the same as Kairi. Her staff clattered to the floor next to her.

"Let them go!" Namine shouted. "Give them their strength back!"

"Make me," Hades taunted.

"You don't want to make me do that," Namine replied. Her voice had gained a sudden quietness; her tone had grown very serious.

"I'll just do the same to you as I did to the Princess and the flower-girl."

"Not if I get to you first," Namine said, her voice still quiet, yet steady.

"You're bluffing," Hades stated.

"Am I?" Namine retorted. "Let them go!"

"You're going to have to be more persuasive than that," Hades said, sounding almost bored. "Or you could just give me something in exchange.

"Persuasive?" Namine asked. "You want me to be persuasive?"

"You have _got _to be bluffing with the amount of stalling you're doing."

"You are making it hard for me to regret doing this," Namine whispered, almost to herself. "I really hate doing this to minds with sentience, but you are _making _me work on feeling bad about doing this to you."

"Doing what to me, Blondie?"

Namine pursed her lips and concentrating, hoping that her memory prowess still worked even though she couldn't Cure. Her magic was different.

Hades gripped his head in pain. Namine's magic was working.

"What? What is this? Pain!" Hades growled.

"It's not me, Boss!" Pain replied.

"Panic?" Hades roared.

Panic had run for cover and was too busy cowering to respond. Pain decided that he would follow Panic's lead.

Hades hair glowed red for a moment. But Namine saw fit to force that to calm down as well, by bringing forth memories that negated the red heat.

"What is this power?" Hades shrieked. He looked Namine right in the eye. "Witch!" he spat.

"I told you to let them go," Namine stated, completely ignoring the witch comment.

"Fine!" Hades panted. "I'll let them go, all right? Just make the pain stop."

"Let them go, first. I know I haven't incapacitated you that much."

Hades waved his hand. Namine heard Aerith and Kairi stirring. She eased up on his memory a little.

"I let them go!" Hades said through gritted teeth. "What more do you want?"

"One more question for you: how come the Dusks are listening to you?"

"I don't have to tell you!"

Namine tugged on more memories. Hades cringed in pain.

"They just listen to me, okay?" Hades grimaced. "I wasn't going to protest."

Seeing that he wasn't lying by the memories that she could see of his, Namine released his memories entirely.

"Well, Dusks aren't going to do much of anything against Disney Castle," she said. "Not while I'm around, anyway."

Hades glared at her. "Where did you get such power?" he asked, ignoring her comment about useless Dusks.

"Heroes should not have that power down here," he continued.

"I haven't always been a hero."

Meanwhile, as soon as Aerith found herself able to move again, she quickly grabbed her staff and stood up. Kairi had stirred, too. She picked herself up as Aerith did. Kairi saw no point in summoning her Keyblade. Nothing seemed to be working here. Well, Namine's control over memories did.

"…I haven't always been a hero," Namine said.

Kairi's mind was flooded with images and feelings of Namine's time in Castle Oblivion. She squinted and blocked them out. She and Namine had gotten to a point to where, usually, neither 'heard' anything from the other unless one of them was projecting certain thoughts and feelings. Kairi's guard, however, had been completely thrown off when Hades' had sapped her strength. She put her guard back up so she wouldn't catch anything of Hades' memory—if Namine was still messing around in there. She shuddered at the glimpses of things she had caught when Namine had been poking through the Shadow's memories. She also remembered the headache that she'd felt a shadow of when Namine had needed to deal with Captain Hook.

Aerith had worked up quite the glare towards Hades. Hades looked like he really wanted to massage his temples at the particular moment, but hadn't done so because he was too busy keeping an eye on Namine. Aerith took in a deep breath to concentrate on two distinct thoughts.

_Rinoa, we're going to need your help getting out of here._

_I need to speak with the King._

As soon as she was sure those thoughts had been completely thought through, she raised her staff and blasted out the strongest Holy spell she could manage at the particular moment. Despite all the strength she put into it, the spell was hardly strong. By the time it hit Hades, it might as well have been just a simple Pearl of a light ball. However, the nature of the attack did what it was supposed to—stun Hades.

"Uh-oh," Pain whispered.

Panic's teeth chattered.

Hades looked like he was about to boil over with anger.

About then, a large pillar of light surrounded Aerith, Namine and Kairi. Before Hades, Pain, or Panic could properly react, it disappeared along with the three girls.

Pain and Panic decided that they did _not _want to be around Hades for the next few hours.

"Well, well, well, what have we got here?" asked a very loud voice.

Namine had to shield her eyes from the sudden brightness around. Though, Aerith and Kairi seemed to have adjusted just fine.

The three of them were staring at a giant, blue-faced person, wearing a Hawaiian t-shirt, and a rather goofy-looking hat.

"More magicians?" he asked. "His Majesty the Mouse said there might be a few more."

Namine and Kairi exchanged glances.

"We're not…" they began.

"For the purposes of this conversation," Aerith said. "I am, but the three of us need to speak with the King, now."

"But he's getting ready for the meeting," the blue-faced man replied, crossing his arms over his chest.

"This is more urgent," Aerith insisted. "Trust me. Who are you, anyway?"

He puffed up his chest. "_I'm_…" he began.

"He's the Genie," Namine said. She'd seen him come up in many memories she had dealt with in the past couple of years.

"Do I know you?" the Genie asked, looking at her inquisitively. "You look familiar. Come to think of it, both of you look familiar." He looked between Kairi and Namine, darting around them—even smelling them, in a hope to trigger something.

"Have you met Xion?" Namine asked, something occurring to her.

"Who?" Genie asked.

"Xion," Kairi said. "She looks kind of like me, but she has dark hair; and, up until rather recently, she didn't wear anything besides a black cloak."

A light bulb went off over Genie's head. "Oh, her? I remember her! I met her and the blonde, spiky-haired boy in Agrabah nearly a year ago. Are they doing all right?"

Kairi and Namine nodded.

"They're our friends."

Aerith cleared her throat.

"The King?" she said once she had everyone's attention. "Can you tell us where he is?"

"Over here;" came, of all people's, Quistis' voice.

Everyone turned to look at the source of the voice. Quistis stood there, her hands placed expectantly on her hips. Next to her, stood Rinoa, who looked massively inquisitive. The King stood in front of them.

"What's going on, guys?" he asked.

"Hades has control over the Dusks, somehow," Namine said, figuring that would be the best place to start.

This made everyone think for a moment. Ever since Organization XIII had been destroyed, the Dusks—and all other Nobodies, for that matter, had pretty much been on their own, causing small problems here and there. But news of someone new having control over Nobodies—even ridiculously lesser ones like the Dusks—was unsettling. Especially if the person who had control over them was someone like Hades.

"How is that possible?" Quistis asked, breaking the silence.

"I don't know," Namine said. "But I saw it in his memories—and I got him to admit it out loud to me."

"How did you manage that?" Genie asked. "No one can get big blue fire-face to admit anything that he hasn't figured out in advance that he wants to tell you."

"That's not the question we need to be focusing on at the moment," Kairi said. "We need to focus on the fact that Hades has the Dusks at his beck and call."

"Do any of the other Nobodies listen to him?" King Mickey asked.

"None that I know of," Namine replied.

Mickey looked at Kairi and Aerith, to see if either of them had any other input on the matter. However, both of them were gesturing that Namine was the one to ask on this one.

"Is there anything else that you learned while you were in the Underworld?" Rinoa asked. "Assuming that that _is _where you ran into Hades?"

"He's planning on coming after Disney Castle," Kairi said.

Before anyone could react to that bit of news, Namine cut them off.

"I told him he'd have a hard time getting that to happen," she said. "While all of us are around, he'd never get anywhere."  
>"I wonder if he was behind the Thorn," Mickey mused.<p>

"Pardon?" Rinoa asked.

Mickey brushed her question off. "We'll discuss it in the meeting. Aerith, will you be joining us?"

"I might as well, considering I'm here. Though, we never did get to practice Holy…"

"Don't worry about it," Kairi said. "The Worlds seem to have other plans for us at the moment. Namine and I understand."

Namine nodded in agreement.

"Kairi," Mickey said, nodding at her. He nodded at Namine as well. "Namine, the two of you are welcome to stay through this meeting, if you would like."

Quistis cleared her throat. "I don't mean to impede, but shouldn't they be more versed in the magical arts? Didn't the invitations go out to only those with high dealings with sorcery?"

Mickey shook his head. "Just because they are as familiar with the magical arts as some of the others here doesn't mean the two of you don't have the propensity for it, given the next few years. Besides, the invitations seem to be having problems getting to those with Keyblades, for Aqua hadn't heard of the meeting before I mentioned it earlier this morning. Something must have gone wrong with the spell."

Mickey shrugged as he said this.

"I don't think this is the place for us," Kairi said. "Not at the moment, anyway."

"We should probably be heading back home, anyways," Namine added. "Plus, we've got a new spell to practice."

"And a Limit," Kairi added.

Mickey nodded. "If that's what you feel, I will not stop you."

"Let us know if there is anything we can do to help," Namine said.

"You already are playing your part," Mickey said with a nod in their direction.

Kairi and Namine smiled.

"We'll be seeing you, then," Kairi said, pulling out the star shard to activate it.


	40. It Began with a Letter

**Author's Note: **Well, guess what, I'm back! (Obviously, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this right now.)

First off, business. My goal was to have this chapter up DAYS ago. (Like, Friday... but then I went to Star Wars Weekend. Which, kinda felt like a convention. So, naturally, nothing got posted. My current goal is to have this up on Monday, but depending on how much I can get done before I go to work when it comes to formatting and stuff... this may not go up until Tuesday.)

Obviously, I'm typing this up significantly before I post the chapter...

I shall try to have a chapter up once a week. I know it's summer and you'd all think I could be writing more, but I can't... because yes, classes have stopped for me... but I'm still working between 35-40 hours a week.

And, in the next few days, my family's coming to visit. So, you probably won't be hearing too much from rar during that time either, since they'll be here for almost two weeks.

(I apologize now for the long author's note.)

Second order of business, I'm planning a special chapter in the near future. I want you all to submit questions to my characters to have them answer. Make them funny, I don't care. Just keep them appropriate. Submit more than one question! It's an experiment and should be fun!

Third order of business, what is with this new picture deal? I should make cover pictures for each of my fics now... hmm...

Okay, I think that's all of the orders of business... Onto the chapter!

* * *

><p>"I only need to be able to understand pixie sometimes."<p>

xx

"You enjoy following me, don't you?" Kuin said, turning around to look at Axel.

Axel shrugged and looked about the town they were in.

"We're in Traverse Town," he mused. "Why are we in Traverse Town? Nothing exciting happens here, except the…"

"Occasionally large Heartless," Kuin finished for him. "And that only happens when there's Keyblades around, because it's only happened a few times over the past several years. I've sort of been tracking it."

Axel made an understanding grunt, too annoyed by her random burst of know-it-all knowledge to give a proper response.

"Why are we in Traverse Town?" he asked again, instead.

"_I _am here because _I_ need potions," she replied. "They're cheap here. I'm assuming _you're _here because you're following me again."

"Precisely," Axel replied.

"How do you keep up with me?" she mused.

Axel smirked, not wanting to let her in on his secret just yet. She wasn't surprised that he wasn't forthcoming on knowledge.

"Well, you're going to have to stop following me at some point, today," she said.

Axel stopped walking, so did she.

"Oh, really?" he asked. "Why?"

"Because where I'm going after this is someplace you weren't invited."

"You do realize that telling me that is just going to make me want to follow you more, right?" Axel said, raising an eyebrow.

She nodded, then shrugged. "I know, I just need you to stop following me after this. I'm not sure _how _it is that you magically keep finding me… is that how you do it? Magic?"

Axel smirked, but said nothing. Kuin sighed, she figured that would be his response.

Rolling her eyes, Kuin turned around and marched right into the Goods Shop. Not surprisingly, Axel followed her.

The owner if the shop greeted them as they walked in, and Kuin wasted no time in purchasing a case of Hi-Potions. When she had finished her purchase, Axel went up and purchased a few potions for himself.

xx

"So what is it that I can't be following you to?" Axel asked as they made their way out of the shop.

"Well, assuming that you magically find me again, it's a meeting for anyone whose strengths are primarily in magic."

"Sounds boring, if you ask me," Axel said with a shrug.

"So you won't be following me, then?" Kuin inquired.

"Going to a meeting doesn't sound fun; _crashing _it, however..."

Kuin groaned. "What is with you!"

"I aim to misbehave," Axel replied with a shrug. "Who all is going to be at this meeting?"

Kuin shrugged. "I don't know any of them personally. I just received an invitation. I_ do _know that there are going to be a lot of people there who are either inherently magic, or make magic their main focus there."

"And where do you fall in the two categories?"

She grunted, not giving an answer one way or another.

"Well, I'm assuming, that since there are all these magic-folk around, I've probably got friends there. So I should just tag along."

"Were you invited?"

"No, so?"

"Then you shouldn't go."

"What does it matter to you?" Axel asked. "It's not like you're responsible for me or anything. Who called this meeting, anyway?"

"That's for me to know and you not to find out anytime soon."

"Sheesh, since when did _you _turn into a little kid?"

Kuin glared at him. "Nothing is stopping me from hopping on my glider and leaving right now," she said quietly.

"Nothing is stopping me from following you."

"_How_ do you keep following me?"

"Magic."

She groaned. "You are so annoying. I don't know why I put up with you."

"Do you want me to stop following you?"

She was taken aback, and her face showed it. She hadn't been expecting him to ask _that _question. She hadn't been expecting him to ask a question at all-rather, she had expected some witty comeback.

"No! Well, not entirely..." she spluttered. "Just for the moment, at least."

Axel looked long and hard at her. He motioned for her to go ahead and leave.

"Go on then. To that important meeting or whatever."

She looked at him, questioning his every motive.

"You won't follow me?"

"Not for a bit, at least," Axel replied, not looking entirely at her, but seriousness written all over his face.

She nodded, her face serious too, now. She pulled out her glider and hopped on. She said nothing to Axel as a portal opened up in front of her; she just nodded curtly and took off before Axel could say another word.

When she was out of sight, Axel stretched and scratched the back of his neck.

"I should probably stop being such a compulsive liar sometimes," he muttered. "Oh well, it's not like I'm going to follow _her_ there or anything. I just want to see what this magical meeting is all about."

He started to pull out his star shard, but then he stopped. "Well, while I'm out, I might as well get that Thunder-resistant belt. The less pain I have to endure if I run into Larxene, the better."

xx

Kuin stared at the very large door in front of her. This marked the first time that she accepted what it is that she was in front of other people. She had been operating on her own for such a long time that she had a weird feeling that she could not place inside her gut. But it was time to start interacting with other people now-or at least people who were out to achieve the same ends that she was out to achieve. The other people inside this room were out to find a balance in the world post-Xehanort. She could hardly believe he was dead, but the invitation to this meeting was proof that he had passed. There wasn't even room to be skeptical; the invitation had been signed with the most non-threatening (provided you were on the right side) official seal there was: Keyblade Master Mickey's seal.

When she had gotten the invitation, she had been a little bit surprised. Not because Master Mickey had called the meeting, but because she had been invited. There must have been a spell worked into every invitation that had gone out to ensure that every person who could help with this cause got the memo. It would have taken a lot of magic, so whoever orchestrated that was both clever and powerful.

She was oddly excited to be here. But here was the kicker: she had never RSVP'd. No one in that room was expecting her. None of them probably had any idea of who she even was.

She put her hand out on the door to open it.

_Here goes everything, _she thought.

Not surprisingly, all eyes turned to her as she entered the room. She took a quick moment to size everyone up.

Master Mickey and his wife were not hard to miss. Neither were the fairies of all shapes and sizes. There were several small clumps of fairies, sitting on enchanted chairs that hovered above the table at nearly eye level, perched on plants that grew out of nowhere, or lounging on a giant treasure chest sitting next to the table (placed there like it was a chair.). There were also fairies that were large enough to sit in regular chairs. There were men in wizard's robes, women in healer and summoner attire, people in typical mage wear. There was a genie, a baboon, and a dragon, a man sitting in a tub who, upon closer examination, was revealed to be part fish. There was a small man sitting on a teacup-like chair wearing a top hat twice the size of his head. And then there were the people who were just dressed regularly, but still carried themselves with the air of magic-well, minus the girl with dark hair lounging in her chair, smacking on some gum. However, she was not to be confused with the other dark haired girl lounging in her chair _not _smacking on gum.

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything," Kuin said, as soon as her cursory overview of the room was over.

"The stars had told me that we would have another joining us," said a man in blue robes wearing a sorcerers hat with stars and a crescent moon on it. Kuin had to wonder if he was behind the magical invitations with the way he reeked of magic.

Master Mickey nodded at her. "We were just getting started. What's your name?"

"Kuin," she replied. "I received your invitation, I was just never able to respond to it."

"No matter," said Master Mickey's wife. "Pull up a chair and join us!"

Just as Kuin was about to look for an empty seat, one appeared in between a brunette woman dressed in pink and an old, frazzled-looking wizard. It wasn't even a standard table chair, it was a comfortable arm chair. Kuin noticed then that it wasn't just the fairies who had different chairs. Everyone, it seemed, was seated in a chair that would be comfortable to them. Kuin took her seat.

One of the fairies jangled angrily. Kuin properly identified her as a pixie and wished she could understand the girl.

"There will not be any more interruptions," said the man with the sorcerer's hat. "I would have informed you all if the stars had told me to expect anyone else."

"A translator would be nice," said the girl with the chewing gum. "Not everyone here speaks pixie!"

"Alex, if you had been paying attention during lessons..."

Alex glared at the boy who had spoken. He was lanky and looked like he was trying too hard to be official.

"Justin, it doesn't matter. I'm the family wizard now. I only need to be able to understand pixie sometimes."

"You're missing the point..."

Kuin noticed that all the pixies were sitting there rather angrily.

"But, really, Alex, if you need a translator that badly, do one yourself!"

"I think I can throw together a simple universal translator for the duration of the meeting," said the old, frazzled wizard.

Alex looked smug, Justin looked angry.

The frazzled-looking wizard rolled back his sleeves, pulling a wand out of one of them. After some nonsensical, but obviously magic words, Kuin felt an odd tingling in her head, but nothing more.


	41. The Call of Darkness

**Author's Note: **Yay! Another update! And I'm (relatively) on schedule. I don't particularly have too much to say, except read the blogs for the answers to your questions, and feel free to continue to submit questions if you think of any more for my charries. Ask to whomever you like, provided they've made an appearance in my stories; WITH THE EXCEPTION of rar's charries. I won't take questions for them. She might though._  
><em>

And, with that, ONTO THE STORY!

(Oh, and I do have cameos from my OCs in this chapter, so don't freak out if there are a few people you've legitly never heard of.)

* * *

><p>"Alex, don't antagonize your brother."<p>

xx

"Perhaps we should do proper introductions, now," said the baboon.

"Excellent idea, Rafiki," said Master Mickey. "I'm Mickey."

"But..." began the man in wizard's robes.

"No more formalities for the moment," Mickey replied. Then he turned to his wife.

"I'm Minnie," she said with a little wave.

"I'm the Fairy Godmother," said an elderly woman dressed in pale blue robes.

"We're the Gullwings," said one pixie. She had short, brunette hair and dressed in blues and pinks.

"There's no need to tell you our names," said another one of them. She had short, sand-colored hair and was dressed all in black.

"But what if they just want to talk to just one of us?" asked the third one with really long blonde hair, dressed in yellow.

"Shouldn't be necessary," replied the one in black.

"Sorry, sir," said the brunette one, hovering over the chest they were sitting on to properly look Mickey in the eye. "It seems like this is the decision."

"No matter," Mickey replied. "If that is your choice, there really is no changing your mind."

He looked from the brunette Gullwing to the woman sitting next to them. She was dressed in a white Summoner's gown and had black hair plaited down her back.

"My name is Garnet," she said.

"My name is Quistis," said a blonde mage with glasses.

"I'm Rinoa," said a woman with wings. Kuin could only assume she was a sorceress. Either that or some type of angel. But angels were rare.

"And I'm Aerith," said the woman in pink sitting next to Kuin.

"I'm Kuin, as I mentioned earlier," Kuin said, staring off at the wall in front of her so she didn't have to look at anyone in particular.

"I'm Merlin," said the frazzled-looking wizard.

"Yen Sid," said the sorcerer with a bow of his head.

"Hatter's the name!" said the man with the top hat much too large for him. "Though some people call me the Mad Hatter. I'm not sure why, though, I'm only mad on Tuesdays and Saturdays, except last month when I skipped two weekends. I'm happy the rest of the time! Or sad... or grumpy..."

Kuin resisted the urge to smack her forehead.

"I'm Yuna," said the girl sitting on the other side of the Mad Hatter, effectively interrupting him. She had brunette hair and was dressed in an older-style of Summoner's robes.

"Clopin," said a man dressed more like a clown than a mage, however his eyes looked very wise.

"My name is Esmerelda," said the woman on the other side of him. She had dark brown hair and striking green eyes.

"I am King Triton," said the merman. Kuin raised her eyebrows; there was another king in the room.

"My name is Rafiki," said the baboon, giving a nod of his head.

"I'm the Genie," said the big blue genie, rather loudly, almost as if he didn't know how loud he actually was.

"I'm Tinker Bell," said one of the pixies..

"I'm Terrence," said another pixie.

"Silvermist."

"Iradessa."

"Rosetta."

"Fawn."

"Bobble."

"Clank."

"Periwinkle."

"Vidia."

As each of the pixies introduced themselves, they got up out of their floating cups and nodded. They were each dressed in bright colors.

"I'm the Enchantress," said the woman on the other side of them. "You need not know my name."

After the bit with the Gullwings not wanted their names said, no one questioned.

"I'm Mushu!" declared a small red dragon. He puffed himself up to look bigger.

"I'm Flora," said a fairy in red.

"I'm Fauna," said the fairy in green.

"And I'm Merryweather," said the fairy in blue.

"I'm Katriona," said a girl with blonde hair and glasses.

"I'm William," said the boy sitting next to her. He had pale skin but dark hair and clothing.

"I'm Alice," said a girl who could not have been anyone but his twin given her looks. She was the other one of the two girls lounging in their chairs.

"I'm Tristan," said a blonde boy with bright blue eyes.

"I'm Justin," said the boy on the other side of him, the wizard who looked like he was trying too hard.

"Alex," said his sister, giving a little wave of her hand.

"We're the Sugar Plum Fairies," said one of the fairies sitting on the leaves. She was a red one and seemed content to speak for them all.

"I'm Mama Odie," said an old woman dressed in mage's robes.

"And I'm the Blue Fairy," said the fairy sitting on the other side of Mickey.

"Welp, that's everyone!" Mickey announced.

"Now what?" asked Mushu.

"Well, I'm sure you all have heard of Xehanort and his doings over the past several years," Mickey said.

Everyone in the room nodded in some form of agreement. Some people even shuddered. Kuin did not visibly shudder, but she did internally cringe.

"Not all of you may have heard of Xehanort's demise, however," Mickey continued.

Some people in the room looked genuinely surprised and relieved to hear this. They had not heard the news. Everyone else had obviously heard of this, but even they still looked relieved. Kuin merely nodded, not letting the relief show any further than her eyes. She had heard the rumors of Xehanort's demise—everything that Axel had been saying would seem to imply that Xehanort was gone. But now, hearing it from King Mickey's mouth, she couldn't not believe it. _He _was finally gone.

"Thought so," Mickey said with a nod. "Well, now it is time to discuss what needs to happen now that he is gone."

"First can you answer me one thing," King Triton said.

"I can certainly try," Mickey replied.

"How long has Xehanort been gone? Surely such a destruction would have left its mark on the worlds for everyone to feel."

"Not with the worlds separated as they are," Minnie replied.

King Triton nodded in understanding.

"It's been about three weeks," Mickey said, answering the other part of the question. "Just over, actually."

Kuin frowned doing some quick math in her head. The first time she had run into Axel had been about three weeks ago, give or take a couple of days. Had he not said, then, that he had helped in the destruction of Xehanort? She had not believed him because she, at the time, couldn't believe that _anyone_ could destroy such a horrible man—if he deserved to be called a man at all. But, assuming Axel _had, _in fact, been involved in Xehanort's demise, she had probably talked to him mere _days _after the fact.

She thought over their meeting again, and every meeting after the fact. Pieces were starting to fit together in her head. However, she needed to stop thinking about that and listen to what Mickey was saying…

"…I'm assuming that the darkness is then caused by a backlash?" Esmerelda was saying.

Mickey nodded. "The Worlds are in upheaval. Some worlds are suffering more than others."

"The Worlds that were closer to the source of the problem—Xehanort—would see more upheaval than those farther away," Yen Sid explained.

"Worlds like Hollow Bastion are certainly seeing trouble currently," Merlin said. "To give one example."

"We've hardly noticed any difference," Katriona said. "Not physically, anyway. The magik smells different, that's all."

"We've seen problems on the magical side of the Wizard portal," Alex said.

Everyone else found it necessary to point out what changes they had seen over the past few weeks. Kuin remained silent; merely listening and taking it in. She had been to some worlds with outbreaks of darkness that were mentioned in the room. Mushu mentioned something, Genie mentioned something, Flora, Fauna and Merryweather mentioned something… She had been to all of those worlds recently, just going where her glider took her. Her mind drifted to when she had been on the little Destiny Islands. What had brought her there? Her glider had just taken her there. There had been an influx of people suddenly showing up on that world—but from what she had seen, nothing had been out of balance. Maybe she hadn't looked far enough.

She had run into Axel. He had been with a blonde boy dressed in greens and browns, wearing a glass Wayfinder around his neck. She hadn't talked to the boy though. The boy looked like Roxas, but he wasn't Roxas. She hadn't asked. She hadn't cared back then.

What if, the influx of people to that world had been a large group of people returning _home_ after a certain battle…

"Excuse me," Kuin said, interrupting the Gullwings as they were talking about how they hadn't noticed any difference in the Worlds.

Everyone's eyes turned to her. This was, after all, the first time she had spoken since giving her name.

"I apologize in advance for the potential rudeness of my question," she continued. "But how do you know, for sure, that Xehanort is dead?"

"I was there."

King Mickey's words were sober and grave. Some people in the room seemed surprised by this answer. Other's didn't. Kuin wasn't surprised—not from what she knew of the King.

"So was I," Aerith chimed in, albeit much quieter. "He was killed in a manner that which would save the other hearts locked up inside of him, but the man known as Xehanort is finally gone."

There was silence for a moment after she spoke.

Until William cleared his throat, that is.

"Then why call a meeting such as this," he asked. "If not to 'take care of' some dark power?"

He put 'take care of' in air-quotations, as if trying to avoid using terms such as 'kowashite.'

"Because there still is a dark power to be dealt with," Mickey replied. "The darkness itself."

The looks given by the people around the room varied. Some looked skeptical, some obviously understood what was going on, some looked as if they'd had many dealings with the darkness already, some merely nodded, some didn't move at all.

"How do we go about dealing with big bad darkness's?" Mushu asked.

"It will have to be little-by-little," Yen Sid said. "Considering there is no one source of the darkness. It is just present."

"So, killing the Heartless deal, again?" Clopin asked.

"And other monsters," Garnet added.

"That's one part of it," Mickey said. "But maybe there is a way to launch a large-scale assault on the darkness."

He looked at Yen Sid warily, as if worried that Yen Sid wouldn't approve of his disagreement.

"Impossible," Kuin spoke up. "There's no way to battle the darkness back entirely. Darkness and Light should be in balance—end of story."

"Such old words from a young woman," Yen Sid mused.

"Perhaps outdated words?" Justin asked.

"Nonsense," Alex replied.

"Are you disagreeing because you have a legitimate reason, or because you just want to disagree with me?"

Alex sat up in her seat and started twirling her hair around a finger, thinking. She did this for several moments, to the point where Justin somehow managed to look smugly peeved.

"See?" he said. "You have no clue."

"Okay, so, yes, I did mostly just say that to disagree with you. But I'm sure there's _some _reason as to why light and darkness should be in balance. I think even Larrytate would agree. And he'd even have a reason!"

"Unlike you," Justin muttered.

"But there is a reason," Quistis said. "Light and darkness must remain in balance."

"But why?" Justin asked.

"You didn't let me finish," Quistis said, pursing her lips.

Justin sat back in his seat like a dog with its tail between its legs.

"Some of it doesn't have a reason," Quistis said. "It is, to an extent, just how the universe has always worked and will always work. But, a balance is necessary for everyone to coexist alongside one another."

"Just because something is fueled by darkness doesn't make it bad," William said.

Very few people noticed Katriona and William clasp hands under the table.

Justin looked at William skeptically. William gave a crooked grin.

"To clarify, however," Katriona said. "The darkness the Worlds are currently dealing with is bad."

"Why?" Justin asked.

"Because it's out of balance," Kuin answered, resisting the urge to shout. How could this young man not understand this? Was he really that naive? Was it because she had grown up with such knowledge of these matters and she took it for granted?

"Kuin, dear, would you take a moment to expand on that?" Minnie asked. "For the ones who don't understand as well."

"Certainly," Kuin replied, leaning forward in her seat.

Everyone's attention was on her again. It felt weird.

"Light and darkness exist in balance for reasons Quistis has already explained," Kuin began, giving a nod in Quistis' direction. "Certain people are more attuned to one side than the other. Most of us in here are probably more attuned to the light, but I'd wager there are a few who are more on the side of darkness, or people who are flexors. Just because someone is more attuned to the darkness doesn't make them bad. Just because someone uses dark powers doesn't mean they are bad. What makes them bad is when they start using their powers—whether made of darkness or light—to try and overpower the other side. Because that's what it all boils down to. The darkness that we are dealing with today is a problem because it's trying to take over the light. That's what Xehanort was fueling it to do because he wanted limitless power, and he knew he'd have a better chance getting that from the darkness than he would the light. Now, with Xehanort gone, the darkness is just doing what it's been doing for the past fifteen or twenty years. However, now it's actually _more _dangerous because no one's controlling it."

Kuin sat back in her seat and took a deep breath. It felt good to let that all out. Maybe now everyone would be on the same page on why things needed to get done.

"Well said," Rinoa told her.

"Thank you," Kuin replied with a nod.

"Contrary to the popular belief, even Kingdom Hearts is a complete balance," Mickey said. "It's not complete light or complete darkness like some people come to believe. It is a balance—a reflection of what the Worlds should be."

"Okay, I get it," Justin said, throwing his hands up in defense. "You all don't need to keep hammering it in."

"We weren't trying to hammer it in," The Fairy Godmother said. "We were just trying to help you understand what's going on."

"Yeah, Justin!" Alex said.

"Alex," the Blue Fairy cautioned. "Don't antagonize your brother."

"Okay," Alex grumbled, sitting back in her seat.


	42. The Smell of Darkness & The King's Light

**Author's Note: **All questions are being answered in my blog! Back from my parent's vacation. Regular postings should commence :)

* * *

><p>"How do you remember all that?"<p>

xx

"I hate to add another interruption," Rosetta said, sounding a tad embarrassed as she spoke. "But what's a flexor?"

Kuin blanched, how had they gotten back to _that _point? She had made it quite some time ago… And she hadn't even made a big deal about it, it had just been mentioned in passing.

"There are two different types of flexors," Rinoa began. Kuin decided she'd just let Rinoa answer this one—assuming she'd do it correctly. So far she was off to a good start.

"There's the type of flexor that I am," Rinoa continued. "That's where you, as a person, are good at magic on both sides of the spectrum—and magic to the extremes at that. It's not hard for you to be casting Holy one minute and then Meteor the next. Usually, that's not something that comes easily to people."

"So, basically it's easy to switch between black magic and white magic," Silvermist said.

"White, black, blue, green, red," Quistis said. "But, mostly black and white."

Rinoa nodded. "Then there's the other type of flexor who is basically the opposite of the type of flexor I just mentioned—they're the ones who are just perfectly centered on everything. Born on the equal line all around. They're incredibly rare."

Kuin tried to keep the smugness off of her face. Rare those flexors may be, but little did _anyone _in the room know that there was one sitting right there.

"So how do we go about batting back the darkness into a balance again?" Alice asked. "Because that's really why we're all here."

Her tone of voice _screamed _ "let's get back on track, please."

"There's not any spell in existence that would do such a thing," Flora mused.

"But maybe we could come up with one," Merryweather said.

"Like Alice said," Fauna said. "I think that's why we're here."

"That's right!" Minnie said.

"What kind of spell are we looking at, here?" Quistis asked.

"Something big, that's for sure," Merlin said, rolling up his sleeves.

"Calm down, I doubt we'll be performing the spell in the next five minutes," Yuna said.

Merlin sighed and let his sleeves fall back.

"Who has thoughts of a spell that could get us pointed in the right direction?" Aerith said. "I think that's where we should start."

xx

"Why am I not surprised that this meeting is here?" Axel said, looking up at the castle looming above him. "I probably know quite a few people here if King Mickey's the one behind this meeting."

He knew that it would take him forever to look through the castle. So he pulled out his star shard again.

"This time take me outside the _room _that Kuin's in…" he began. Before he could finish his sentence, his star shard had activated and he was off. He found himself standing outside two large double doors.

"…rather than just the building," he finished, pocketing the star shard.

He rubbed his hands together and cracked his knuckles.

"Time to crash this party," he said to himself, pushing on the doors.

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything," he said, bravado seeping into his voice.

The groan from Kuin was unmistakable. Everyone else in the room seemed rather surprised. Some even, in fact, pulled out weapons. Three little pixie-like substances pulled out various weapons (not that they'd do much good given their size). One boy who he didn't recognize had a ball of dark flames in his hand. Dark flames that seemed to spark with electricity. A girl dressed in gypsy attire had a knife pulled on him.

"I suppose I should have expected that," he muttered, looking around the room for faces he recognized. He knew Kuin, the King, Minnie, Aerith, Rinoa, Quistis and Merlin. Oh, and Yen Sid. He was able to pick out Tinker Bell and the Mad Hatter, and he recognized the Fairy Godmother and the Genie. But, other than that, everyone else was a new face.

"Does anyone know this guy?" a girl with long brown hair asked. She had a wand in her hand that she was currently using to twirl her hair around. "Because, I don't know about you, but I don't think he's magical."

"Axel," Aerith asked. "What are you doing here?"

"Seeing what this meeting here's about," Axel replied, crossing his arms over his chest. "What does it look like I'm doing? I heard talk and I had to come see."

He conveniently left out _who _he'd heard talking. He didn't want to rat Kuin out. If he played the cards right (to sound like Luxord) she'd rat herself out.

Little by little, the weapons, at least, disappeared. The skeptical looks didn't though.

"He's not magik," a girl with a long blonde braid said. "Well, he can use magik, it's just not his main focus. I smell fire on him though."

Axel looked at her. "What?" he asked.

"You smell like fire," she said, plain as day.

"She means you smell like you can use fire," said the black-haired boy sitting next to her. "You know, magikally?"

As he said the word "magically" he wiggled his fingers, as if it would make the point clearer.

"I don't think you have to interpret for her, he looks smart enough to figure it out," said a black-haired girl that could only be the black-haired boy's twin.

Axel frowned, feeling like he was being talked about in a very demeaning manner. Fire came almost instinctively to his hands. The black-haired children seemed a bit scared off. The blonde girl didn't look surprised in the slightest.

"Axel!" Mickey shouted, bringing him back to his senses.

"Sorry," he muttered, ditching the fire. That route wouldn't have gone all that well anyway. The black-haired children were all the way across the room. Ironically enough, he was standing behind Kuin and Aerith. _That _would _not _have ended well.

"What _really _brings you here?" he asked. "Surely more than just curiosity. You don't strike me as the type of person to come investigate something like this out of sheer just wanting to know. You'd have to be _told _to come to something like this. No one has that sort of power over you, still, do they?"

Mickey almost sounded worried.

"Or he'd have to be told _not _to come to something like this," Kuin muttered.

"Pardon?" Mickey said.

"Doesn't he strike you as the person to come crash something like this _purely _because someone told him not to?" Kuin asked.

"But who told him not to?" Merlin asked.

All eyes were either on Kuin or on Axel.

Kuin turned to Axel. They locked eyes.

_Are you going to tell them?_

"I told him not to come," Kuin said, her eyes still on Axel.

The phrase "I knew you would cave first" was written all over Axel's face, much to Kuin's chagrin.

"You know each other?" Aerith asked.

"Yes, actually, we do," Kuin said.

"Axel," Minnie said. "Is this true?"

"What? Am I not allowed to know people?" Axel asked, looking away from Kuin.

"Of course you are!" Minnie said. "It's just, she's been answering every question and you've been quiet."

"Yes, Axel, you've been quiet," Kuin said. "Which is rather unusual for you."

"What is there to say?" Axel asked.

"It would appear that most people in the room are wondering how it is that you two know each other," said a baboon. "For it seems that you two are two very unlikely people to actually know each other. I, personally, find that very intriguing. I am sure that others in the room do so as well."

"We ran into each other on Destiny Islands once, not too long ago," Axel said. "Since then we just keep meeting up on various Worlds."

Kuin snorted.

"We've even destroyed large hordes of Heartless on a couple of Worlds," Axel continued, trying to cover up Kuin's snort. It didn't go entirely unnoticed, but no one commented. Mickey and Yen Sid, however, appeared to be thinking rather hard.

Axel grimaced, realizing something. He'd just given them away. Mickey had wanted to meet her—to ask her about light corridors; a subject Axel now knew to be on the list of things not talked about by Kuin. Axel would bet anything that Kuin hadn't mentioned what exactly she was. Mickey and Yen Sid would have probably just let her go (well, maybe…) without question… and he'd just ratted her out by saying how they kept meeting up, knowing that Mickey and Yen Sid both _knew _he had been out searching for her.

This was completely backwards from his original plan. Though, she had let the cat out of the bag on why he was there…

Kuin, too, seemed to realize that there was something going on, based on the look on Axel's face. She licked her lips and glared at him.

"Not to be rude, or anything," a pixie with black hair dressed in purple spat. "Not that my rudeness would in any way be more rude than this guy showing up; but, really, why do we _care _how they know each other? It can be a small World sometimes. Personally, I'd like to know if we're going to kick him out because he's not magic. I don't care if he can make fire come out of his hands, he's not magic. And, come to think of it, how can you call such a meeting when none of us have seen _you _perform that much magic."

She instantly clapped her hands over her mouth, as if she could take in the last couple of sentences—for it was obvious that those should not have been said out loud, even if she had been thinking them. The rest of her pixie friends looked at her in shock, torn between not wanting to be associated with her in any way, and just plain disbelief that she would say something like that.

Several people around the table were glaring at the little pixie, most of them had seen the King's magic first-hand and knew what a powerful Sorcerer he could be.

"Do not question my former apprentice," Yen Sid said.

"Vidia," Minnie said. "Perhaps it would be best if you sat the rest of the meeting out. Normally I wouldn't say such a thing after just one outburst, I do like to give second chances. However, given the nature of your words, I don't think I'm comfortable letting you stay in here."

Vidia paled.

Minnie clapped her hands and several brooms walked into the room, pushing Axel out of the way. He nearly stumbled and fell over. He gripped the back of Kuin's seat for support.

Vidia said nothing as the brooms ushered her out of the room. Everything went silent for a bit.

"Is there anyone else who thinks I am not a proper mage?" Mickey asked, looking around the room.

Everyone else shook their head sincerely.

"I understand that there may be some uncertainty," Mickey continued. "Considering the Keyblade seems to break all rules in the general order of things. I did invite other Keyblade Wielders, the invitations were just declined."

"The rest of us here do not doubt you," Rafiki said with a courteous bow of his head.

"Yeah," the Genie added. "We all know you're the Mouse!"

"I don't see why anyone would doubt you, Majesty," Mushu said. "That little pixie just didn't know what she was saying!"

"I really must apologize for Vidia," Iradessa said. "She speaks without thinking a lot."

"Anyone who has seen you on the battlefield knows that you are certainly fluent in the magical arts," Aerith said. "As fluent as you are with the Keyblade, if not more so."

Mickey flushed. "Thank you, I really do appreciate all your kind words."

Axel scratched the back of his neck.

"I really feel out of place now," he said. "I didn't mean to cause such an uproar. I mean, I meant to cause trouble, but not like this. I think I'm just going to step out now."

He turned to leave, but was surprised when he found someone's hand on his arm. He was even more surprised when he looked back and saw that it was Kuin.

"This time," she said. "I think I'll find you."

There were a lot of thoughts that ran through Axel's head right then. He didn't voice most of them. They were all too cocky and conceited. He wasn't too fond of being really conceited with King Mickey and Aerith in the room. He settled with just nodding.

He turned to leave once more, but was stopped by Mickey, that time around.

"Axel, do you know what's going on with Sora, Riku, and the others?" he asked.

Axel nodded, confused. "Yeah, why do you ask? Is there something wrong?"

"No," Mickey replied. "Nothing's wrong. I just like to stay informed of what's going on in other fights. I was wondering if you were aware of what they've been up to."

Axel nodded, putting his hands in his pockets. "Yeah," he said. "I've got a general idea. I don't typically go out fighting with Sora and Riku, it's usually some combination of Roxas and Xion, but I could probably tell you what all of them have been up to over the past week or so."

"Don't tell me," Mickey said. "I'm a little busy at the moment. If you would though, could you go inform Goofy?"

"Yeah, sure," Axel said. "Do you know where Goofy is? Or am I just going to have to look throughout the Castle?"

"I would check the courtyard," Mickey said. "If he's not there, though, I don't know where he would be."

"I'm sure you'll find him," Kuin said. "You're very good at finding things."

"That I am," Axel admitted. "All right, I'll be going then. Have fun everyone."

He left the room before he could cause any more trouble. He hadn't wanted to put the King on the spot like that, not in the slightest. That dumb pixie…

As he left, he caught a bit of the conversation.

"Where were we?" Merlin asked, does anyone remember.

"Minnie was just talking about how we didn't want to subdue the darkness entirely, so the spell that Yuna had mentioned wouldn't work, even if we could do it on a large scale," Tristan said. "However, the Sugar Plum fairies were going to give an example of something that might work."

"How do you remember all that?" William asked.

Tristan shrugged. "I just do."

Axel snorted. Such interesting people. He'd probably never see half of them again. Then again, he saw a lot of people.

He started walking toward the courtyard to see if Goofy was there. If not, then he'd just resort to the star shard, like Kuin had been suggesting.

He wondered if she'd actually come and find him, or if she was just saying that to get him to stop following her around for a while. Oh well, he'd find out soon enough.


	43. The Afternoon Streets

**Author's Note: **Hey, guess what guys! I'm uploading on schedule this time! Woohoo! _  
><em>

Erm, the usual slew of stuff... all questions are answered on the blog, review please, enjoy the fic and all that jazz.

Oh, still accepting questions for my charries for the potential special chapter. I'm gonna start writing it here pretty soon, which means I'm still taking questions :) (Granted, I can't promise I'll answer ALL of them, but for the most part, I don't see why I wouldn't. I may combine questions if they're similar, but other than that... it'd have to be inappropriate or spoilers for me not to have my charries answer them.)

* * *

><p>"How about you do some work?"<p>

xx

"Kairi, they're down here too!" Xion shouted.

Kairi sliced through a Shadow and looked down below the bridge she was standing on. Sure enough, Xion was not only dealing with Shadows, but some Soldiers and Sergeants as well.

"Fire!" she said, aiming her Keyblade at one of the Soldiers. It died.

She threw two more Fires at two other Soldiers and watched them disappear. Then she went back to the Shadows that were on the bridge.

"Is that all you can do?" Xion asked.

"I'm a little busy up here," Kairi argued.

"Use a stronger spell," Xion suggested. "Don't you need to be practicing Holy?"

"That's guaranteed to use a lot of magic, I don't want to waste it."

"Way to be logical," Xion muttered. "How about Fira or Thundara?"

"I don't know Thundara yet," Kairi said. "Let me do Fira."

"I forget how much you don't know sometimes," Xion said, slicing through three Soldiers, though only killing two.

Kairi was too busy focusing on the spell to respond. She successfully cast Fira, it killed two Shadows.

"I'm only doing this because fighting split up like this isn't a good idea," Xion said, raising her Keyblade to the sky.

"Thundaga."

Lightning danced around the bridge Kairi was standing on, killing every single Heartless it touched. When the spell was through, only a few Heartless remained, which Kairi took care of easily.

"Now get down here," Xion said.

Kairi took a running jump off the bridge, did a somersault in midair, then landed on her feet, taking out a ring of Heartless as she went.

"Well, that was graceful," Xion commented.

"Thanks," Kairi said, running a hand through her hair in an attempt to get her bangs out of her face. "I've been working on that."

"Wanna see something cool?"

"Sure!"

Xion nodded and launched herself at the nearest Heartless. She slashed at it and then used its disappearing body to propel herself forward yet again. She repeated this process again on the next several Heartless. One disappeared on her too quickly and she ended up using the wall instead, but she kept moving forward with little more than a grunt. After doing this a dozen or so times, she landed nimbly on the ground. She brought her Keyblade up in an arc, sending out a wave of light that killed more Heartless. She thrust her Keyblade down, sending out a plain old shockwave that stunned all the Heartless it hit. She then moved forward to start taking out the ones she had stunned. Kairi took the liberty to join her in this endeavor.

"That's quite impressive," Kairi said.

"It's the new finisher I've been working on," Xion said.

"It's good!"

There weren't that many Heartless left after all of that. Kairi and Xion were able to take care of the remaining ones without too much trouble.

"Hmm," Xion mused, banishing her Keyblade. "You need either a big Heartless or a lot of them for Holy, don't you?"

"To make it worth it, yeah."

"And that wasn't a lot of Heartless?"

"I've seen more in one place."

"Where?"

"World that Never Was, um, Castle Oblivion…"

"Right. So, more, bigger Heartless. Maybe in the Tunnels!"

"Where?"

"In the Tram Tunnels—the Underground Concourse."

"Lead the way," Kairi said.

Xion nodded, and gestured for Kairi to follow her.

So the two girls went off in the direction of the underground tunnels that the Trams went through.

"You sure seem to know where you're going," Kairi mused as they navigated the tunnels with seemingly experienced ease.

"When I worked for the Organization, I had a lot of missions down here, exterminating Heartless and whatnot. I learned my way around because of that."

"Oh, I suppose that would do it."

"What's bothersome is that there's not too many Heartless in here," Xion said, frowning.

"I'd say don't say that, because then Heartless would show up, but that's what we want," Kairi laughed.

A few Heartless appeared, but it was hardly enough to make either Kairi or Xion stop. The Heartless had merely been Shadows, which Xion was capable of striking down several in one strike and Kairi could get one every Keyblade stroke.

"Maybe let's go through there," Kairi said, pointing to the door with a giant "1" over it.

"We won't be in the Concourse anymore," Xion said.

"We don't seem to be finding that many Heartless here," Kairi pointed out.

"True."

"Maybe Twilight Town just isn't hit too hard with Heartless today," Kairi suggested.

"Possible," Xion agreed. "That does happen. But, we still have Sunset Terrace to go through."

As she said this, the two of them walked through the gate and meandered into Sunset Terrace.

"I think I know where Twilight Town's population of Heartless is at right now," Xion said, looking at all the Heartless swarming the streets. There were shouts and yells from the local townsfolk as they tried to keep the Shadows of various sizes out of their homes.

"The darkness feels disgusting," Kairi murmured. "Can't you feel it?"

"No," Xion said. "But I'm not surprised that you can, given your 'heart of pure light' thing."

Kairi shrugged, then shuddered. "I can feel it, it's... sad..."

"Enough about how the darkness feels, already," Xion said, laughing. "Let's start destroying them!"

With a shout, Xion took off, Keyblade bared, the the closest cluster-clump of Heartless. Kairi followed after her, sans shout. The two girls proceeded to hack and slash their way through several groups of Heartless before they were even remotely tired.

"You going to try your spell out anytime soon?" Xion asked, chucking up a Blizzaga for the humor of watching a giant icicle fall on several Heartless' heads, squashing them.

Kairi nodded. She focused on a group of Mega Shadows. She aimed her Keyblade at them and channeled the light she knew was in her.

"Holy," she said.

A blast of pure Holy magic erupted from the tip of Kairi's Keyblade, hitting a dozen or so Heartless and blasting them back, but they hadn't even hit the ground before they had disappeared.

"Nice one!" Xion shouted.

"Thanks!" Kairi replied. "Now to let my magic recharge."

"That's just part of it," Xion said, before they both returned their full attention to the battle at hand.

They continued on like that: slashing at Heartless and then using stronger spells as their magic allowed for it. They made sure that at least one of them had enough magic for a double-Cure in case of an emergency. So far, though, Kairi had only cast Cure once and Xion had used a well-placed Cura. Kairi used Holy twice more and began to get an idea on how it needed to be controlled. She was certainly getting better.

As they worked their way through the Heartless, the sounds of more than just their two Keyblades became apparent.

"Who else is here?" Xion asked, pausing for a moment to look around.

Kairi sliced through a Deserter that had headed right for Xion when her guard was down. Xion rolled her eyes at herself for being so careless. Kairi didn't really care though.

"It's not Sora and Roxas," Kairi said. "I would know. I just would."

"Yeah, I get the feeling that I would too," Xion said. "Do you think it's Riku and Namine?"

"I hear too many Keyblades for it to be just Riku," Kairi said. "He's good, but he's not _that _good."

"Then who?" Xion asked, laughing a little about Kairi's comment about Riku.

"Let's go find out!"

Kairi took off running in the direction of the sounds of the Keyblade swipes. Xion took off after her, killing Heartless as she went. Kairi only dodged through them, however, she did so rather nimbly.

They came up to the beautiful waterfall fountain. Usually, the water was so crystal clear that it gave off a perfect reflection of whatever was standing in front of it. Today, however, it was gnarled and blackened by the sheer amount of (rather large) Heartless around it. It was then when Kairi and Xion saw some familiar faces.

"Aqua, Terra, Ven!" Kairi exclaimed.

"Just in time," Terra replied. "There's more coming, I can just feel it!"

"Why are there so many Heartless here?" Xion asked.

"We think we're near the Keyhole," Aqua replied. "No time for questions though, we need to get rid of this mess!"

"On it!" Xion said.

"You can count on me!" Kairi added.

"Use Holy!" Xion said.

"I don't have enough magic for that," Kairi said. "Not at the moment, anyway."

"You need to boost your magic _so _bad," Xion muttered.

"Here," Aqua said, handing Kairi an ether. "Use this."

Kairi did so. As soon as her magic was replenished, the brandished her Keyblade at the largest clump of Heartless she could find. The blast of Holy magic that ensued was the brightest one yet. It also did the most damage. There was now a giant hole in the Heartless' ranks.

"Whoa!" Ven exclaimed. "How long until you can do that again?"

"It's going to take me a bit," Kairi responded. "Unless I use another ether, and I don't want to burn through Aqua's stock."

"Ven, how about you do some work!" Terra teased.

As he said this, he gained a white-blue aura around him and his Keyblade glowed with light. He grinned and started attacking the Heartless.

"Whoa," Kairi and Xion both whispered.

Ven took Terra's advice and started using an increased amount of Thunder magic. It wasn't long before he gained a bright green aura around him and the Thunder magic suddenly seemed apart of every single attack he made. Even with all the Thundaras and Thundagas, he was using a lot of Magneras and Magnegas as well. It wasn't long before his bright green Aura changed to a bright blue one. He also gained six Keyblades of light around him.

Kairi had seen something like this before, back when Sora had done the super-combo to kill the Xehanort Replica that had thrown her off a cliff. She wondered how much help he'd had from Ven.

Meanwhile, Aqua had a pinkish-purple aura around her and she was spinning about the battlefield, attacking Heartless with pillars of light and just pure magic. Her Keyblade hardly seemed to be in her hands, but rather hovering all about telekinetically, killing every Heartless it touched.

Kairi had to force herself to pay attention to the fight and do her share of the work. But all of these different fighting styles were so intriguing to her. She made a mental note to ask one of them about the styles once they had taken care of this current Heartless problem and anything that might immediately follow that. She slashed at nearby Heartless, trying to work her magic back up.

Xion, however, hadn't even noticed the different fighting styles. She was much to occupied with her own share of the fighting and trying to improve on her finisher to notice.

It didn't take too much longer for Kairi's magic to come back. When she felt it completely replenish, she took a deep breath and took a couple of steps back and focused on as many Heartless as she could see. She happened to be aiming at the large cluster around the waterfall. Had the Heartless not been there, she'd be aiming at the waterfall itself.

"Stand back!" she called.

Xion immediately back-flipped out of the way, taking out two or three Heartless as she went. She had been waiting for this. Ven nimbly jumped out of the way as well, as soon as he figured out which way he was jumping out of. Terra took his time, but he also took out a lot of Heartless as he did. Aqua merely moved as much out of the way as she needed to, looking at Kairi curiously, as if learning exactly what Kairi was doing.

"Holy," Kairi spoke.

The beam of magic was unmistakable. It left a very visible hole in the Heartless' ranks, and the ones remaining were certainly scattered and disoriented afterwards. The beam of Holy also did something else.

The waterfall had been cleansed from the gnarled darkness around it thanks to Kairi's Holy spell. Now that it was no longer shrouded in darkness, there was something shimmering behind the water—barely visible, as if it was just coming out to be seen.

It was a Keyhole. And not just any Keyhole, it was Twilight Town's Keyhole. Kairi had just cleared a path to it and revealed it for all to see.

So while this was excellent for all the Keyblade barers in the vicinity to lock the Keyhole up…

It was very bad because there were still several dozen Heartless milling about.


	44. Pretty, Pretty Abilities

**Author's Note: **Just got back from a con! Fun times. Met River Song. I mean, Alex Kingston. (For those of you who don't watch Doctor Who... you should. Because it's awesome. And then you'd know who I'm talking about.)

Sadly, I also had my wallet stolen and by the time I had recovered it, there wasn't any cash left in it.

But... that's besides the point. Here's the chapter!

* * *

><p>"You guys have fun now!"<p>

xx

"Quick! Before the Heartless get to the World's Heart!" Aqua cried.

_What I wouldn't give for Namine to be here right now so we could do a good combo? _Kairi thought to herself.

Namine didn't even respond. Not that Kairi expected her to. They were worlds apart. The connection would be horribly weak at best—if there was still a link over such a great distance. They hadn't really tested it.

"We need to use light," Xion said. "That's the only thing that's going to work fast enough."

Aqua and Ven immediately started blasting the Heartless with Pearls of light. Terra couldn't wield light on command, but he did start using more magic faster. No one blamed him for it. Xion started letting out a few plumes of light. They were weaker than her usual.

"Where's Roxas when you need him?" she muttered.

Roxas was with Sora. Kairi wished that Sora was there too. He was used to dealing with this sort of thing. Kairi felt like she was in horribly over her head. She and Xion had really only come to bash some Heartless for practice—not protect a Keyhole.

She closed her eyes, trying to scrape together her last remaining magic. If she could just get _one _more burst of Holy…

She suddenly felt _very _connected with the Keyhole. It was crying out to her for help. It could feel the darkness spreading from the Heartless, seeping in, trying to take over. Therefore, Kairi could feel them too.

The Heartless were multiplying, excited. They were close.

The dark tendrils seeping into the Keyhole might as well have been seeping into her very bones. She shivered at the feeling. She could feel the Keyhole cry more. It was dying, trying to bat back the Heartless. If they succeeded, all of Twilight Town would die.

"No!" she screamed.

The Keyhole lashed back at the Heartless, surging with power in tandem with Kairi's outburst of protest. Kairi suddenly felt her magic increase. She and the Keyhole were feeding off of each other.

Not wasting any moment, Kairi bared her Keyblade. She let out a burst of light, somewhere on par with what she dealt Xehanort several weeks ago.

"Let the Keyhole give you power," she shouted.

Whether or not they actually received power and dealt out light attacks, Kairi did not know. All she could see was the Keyhole and everything that entailed.

The Heartless disappeared in the ensuing burst of light. They didn't stand a chance.

"Seal it!" Xion shouted.

Kairi's Keyblade was already connected to the point that it almost didn't matter. All she had to do was switch her focus from destroying the darkness trying to paw its way in to sealing the Keyhole so this wouldn't be a problem anymore.

_Lock_, she thought.

The Keyhole happily obliged.

Then everything faded to black.

xx

Kairi awoke to being smacked in the face by Xion.

"Be gentle," Aqua warned.

"Sorry," Xion muttered.

Kairi opened her eyes and saw four faces staring back at her. Ven's sparkling blue eyes looked worried. Terra's beady blue ones showed traces of concern as well. Aqua's whole face showed determination. Xion just looked impatient.

Kairi realized her Keyblade was still gripped tightly in her hand. She banished it.

"Would you like to explain what happened?" Xion asked.

"I saw the Keyhole," Kairi replied.

"Well of course you saw the Keyhole…" Xion began. "Oh, you saw more than that. This has something to do with the fact that you're a Princess, doesn't it?"

Kairi frowned. "So none of the rest of you got power from the Keyhole? None of the rest of you felt what I felt?"

Everyone else shook their heads.

"Well, regardless of what happened, the Keyhole's sealed now," Terra said.

"Are you okay?" Ven asked.

Kairi propped herself up by her elbows.

"I think so, yeah," she said.

"Whatever you did, it worked," Aqua said.

"I just wanted to get enough magic for another burst of Holy, I figured that would take care of the Heartless… but then… the Keyhole, it helped me!"

"I'm not going to ask," Terra said. "That sort of knowledge is behind me."

"I've always been connected to Keyholes," Kairi said, slowly, as if she was just now realizing it. "I just never really knew how much until today."

She took that moment to go ahead and finish sitting all the way up. Her elbows were beginning to hurt anyway.

"How did you know we were so close to a Keyhole?" Xion asked, looking at Aqua.

"We'd been looking for this one for a day or so now. Twilight Town's not a very large world. We knew we'd be getting close."

"Do Heartless always surround Keyholes like that?" Kairi asked.

"Pretty much always," Terra said. "Either we reveal the Keyhole and the Heartless come after it, or we get there and the Heartless are already close, just not close enough to get inside."

"This was our closest call, I would say," Ven said.

"Thank you for helping us," Aqua said, looking between Kairi and Xion.

"Oh, thank Kairi, I hardly did squat compared to her."

Kairi blushed.

"I had a question to ask you," she said, changing the subject.

"Yes?" Aqua asked.

"Those fighting styles," Kairi said. "Like when you get an aura around you, and your Keyblade glows with light, or you get more Keyblades made entirely of light…"

She looked at Ven as she said the last part.

"Command Styles?" Ven asked.

"Sure, if that's what you call them."

"Things like Fever Pitch, and Wingblade, right?"

"She doesn't know what those mean, Ven," Aqua said.

"Oh."

"Well, like when you got all those extra Keyblades of light," Kairi said, pantomiming six more Keyblades surrounding her.

"Yeah, that's Wingblade, it's a Command Style, what about it?"

"How do you do it?"

Ven looked at Aqua and Terra. Terra frowned. Aqua bit her lip.

"It's an old style," Aqua said.

"It's our style," Terra argued.

"Yes, but you have to remember that it's now ten or fifteen years outdated."

"Way to make us feel old, Aqua," Ven teased.

"It's something we grew up with," Aqua said, looking at Kairi. "And not something I have the ability to teach. Master Eraqus did all of that, and he's not around any longer."

Kairi's face fell.

Ven scrunched up his face, thinking. "Aqua's right when she says it's an old style," he said. "One thing that I've noticed is that fighting now seems to focus a lot on working together as a team—Command Styles are really individual."

"You guys use them to fight alongside each other," Xion argued, putting her hands out in an 'I'm-just-saying' manner.

"Yes, but then sometimes you have to worry about it becoming a competition," Terra said. "Or, at least, I do."

"We do it because it's what we know," Aqua said. "Maybe we have something to learn from your combos."

Kairi and Xion looked at each other.

"But we don't have any combos," Kairi said.

"Not yet, anyway," Xion said.

Ven leaned over and whispered something in Aqua's ear. Kairi could only catch bits and pieces like: "can't you make charms" and "Kairi seemed _so _excited by them."

"I think I can do that," Aqua said.

"Do what?" Kairi asked.

"I can make some charms, embodying the different Command Styles. I think I can get them to work in the way a combo would."

"So like, you give us a charm, Kairi and I can use it an imitate one of the Command Styles?" Xion asked.

Aqua nodded.

"Does it have to be a combo?" Xion asked.

"That's the only way I know how to make them. Like I said earlier, Master Eraqus never had the chance to teach me how to teach Command Styles. That's something only Master's know."

"How long will it take?" Kairi asked.

"The charm itself shouldn't take too long. Maybe about an hour to do all of them. I just need something to perform the charm _on_."

"We could go buy a charm-necklace," Ven said. "Separate it and bewitch each charm. Or cut a belt into different pieces…"

"I have some sea-shells," Xion said, her hand reaching into her pocket almost subconsciously.

"How many?" Aqua asked.

"How many do you need?" Xion asked, a small smirk on her face.

"About a dozen," Aqua said. "That should be enough to cover the ones I know."

"You don't know that many!" Ven argued.

"No, but between the three of us, I'd say that's about how many I'm familiar with."

Before Ven could argue back, Xion handed Aqua exactly twelve sea-shells of different varieties.

"Oops, let me keep that Thalassa, please," Xion said, taking it back and replacing it with a simple, pink, fan-looking-like one.

Aqua made no complaints about the change in shell.

"How do you fit that many shells into your pocket?" Ven asked.

Xion merely shrugged, still smirking just a bit.

"Let's go find a better place to do this," Terra suggested, standing up. "That way we're not all squatting on the ground."

"Good idea," Xion said, jumping to her feet. She offered a hand out for Kairi to take and helped Kairi up.

"I feel like a lot has happened in the past ten minutes," Kairi muttered.

"Yeah, well, I feel like this happens a lot," Xion replied with a shrug.

Kairi shrugged as well and the two of them started off after the other three.

xx

Two hours later, as well as lunch and some good conversation time, Aqua had finished all of the charms.

"I hadn't necessarily intended them for to work out this way," she said, gesturing to the small bag they were now in. "But it just sort of happened."

"What?" Xion asked.

"Once you and someone else use one of the charms, that charm becomes linked so only the two of you can use that Style," Aqua said. "It was a pull of the magic. I let that happen rather than risk something backfiring."

"So basically, if Xion and I use one of these charms, it's not good for anyone else but us?" Kairi asked.

Aqua nodded. "But, so long as one of you has the charm on you, you can use the Style as many times as you want. Just give it a minute or two in between to recharge."

"Seems fair," Kairi said.

Xion nodded in agreement.

"Be sure to share with your friends!" Aqua said.

"Of course!" both girls agreed.

"How do you activate them?" Kairi asked.

"The first time all you need to do is both of you grab ahold of the charm, it will do the rest," Aqua answered.

"How many people can use the charm?" Xion asked. "Like, at a time."

"I would caution against more than three. I made the charms to handle two or three only. More than that might weaken the Style or lead to complications."

"Makes sense," Xion said.

"I kind of want to go test one of them out," Kairi said, looking at Xion with a mischievous glint in her eye that Xion was only used to seeing on her own face—not staring back at her.

"Shall we go to The World that Never Was and see if Sora and Roxas could use some help?" Xion suggested.

"That sounds like an excellent plan," Kairi said.

"You guys have fun, now," Ven said.

"Oh! How rude of us!" Kairi exclaimed. "Would the three of you like to come with us? We didn't even offer!"

"The World that Never Was is a World with a sealed Keyhole," Terra said. "There really would be no reason for us to drop in there…"

"I think the three of us need rest more than anything," Aqua said. "You girls go and have some fun with those charms, okay?"

"Okay!"

Kairi grabbed the bag of charms and she and Xion disentangled themselves from the table that they were sitting at. They linked arms and Xion activated the star shard.

They arrived in an eerily quiet section of The World that Never Was. However, just as their feet hit the ground, Neoshadows began appearing.

"Which one should we use?" Kairi asked, opening the bag.

They didn't need to look any farther than the very shiny bluish-white one.


	45. The One Who Walks in the Twilight

**Author's Note: **SOOOOOO, it's been a couple of weeks, but HERE'S ANOTHER CHAPTER! Five chapters away from the Q and A chapter. If you still have questions for Aqua, Terra, Ven, any FF charries, or previous Organization members, I am accepting questions for them still. Oh, and Kuin. So, basically, just not Sora, Riku, Kairi, Namine, Roxas, Xion or Axel. Still taking questions! (If you care to submit.)

Erm... 10 days till my best friend and boyfriend come to visit! Woohoo! 4 weeks until my Program is over... which is bittersweet.

Other than that... got a new phone... still don't have a freaking debit card... need to start planning for school.

And to a crapton of other stuff. Yup, sounds about right.

On that note, here's the chapter! (which I said virtually nothing about in this Author's note...)

* * *

><p>"What a nice interruption, dinner's ready!"<p>

xx

Riku and Namine looked around a very different Hollow Bastion. It was mostly different because there weren't any Heartless roaming about—at least, not in the area they were in.

"Sure this is the right one?" Riku asked, his voice teasing.

Namine started searching around. It didn't take her long to find Cloud. Not too far down in his memories was an image of Sephiroth, cutting down a light fixture at Destiny Islands High.

"We're in the right place," she said.

Riku put his arm around her. "I figured we would be. That other universe is, something special…"

"Don't you mean the Shadow?" Namine asked.

"Yeah, well, him too," Riku grumbled.

"Aerith and them in the other universe are nice," Namine said. "Like they are here. They're just, different, that's all."

Riku shrugged. The two of them started walking in the direction of Aerith's house.

"Sadly, we had to run into the Shadow—or, Shad, rather…"

"Shad?" Riku asked.

"He likes to think himself as that. Either that or his full title, which is Sora's Shadow."

Riku rolled his eyes and muttered some very unkind words towards Sora's Shadow.

"I can see why Kairi dislikes him so much," he said after a bit.

"Kairi dislikes him for more reasons than that," Namine said. "The main reason is actually because she has such a hard time believing that Sora can spawn something like _that_."

"Well, our Sora wouldn't. But obviously the Sora in that universe did."

Namine nodded sullenly.

The two of them fell silent on the subject, not sure what else to say since they were both still mulling over everything that had just happened. They both knew that the other was okay for the most part, and that's all that mattered.

They came up to Aerith's house and Namine knocked on the door. It was Leon who answered.

"Hello," he said. "What can I do for you?"

"We just dropped by to visit," Namine said.

"Not true," Riku said. "We came over to see if you needed any help since we know Aerith, Rinoa and Quistis went to that meeting."

"An' Merlin," Cid said from the table, where he was drinking tea. "Don't ferget him."

"Funnily enough," Zack said from the corner where he was doing squats. "They all left and it's been quiet since they did."

"It's like the calm before the storm," Cloud said quietly, sipping his tea from the couch, looking like he did this every day.

"Come in," Leon said, before he could be interrupted again.

Riku and Namine did so.

"You know, if it wasn't for the fact that Aerith's house cleans itself, this place would be a mess," Yuffie announced, pounding down the stairs.

"Says someone who doesn' clean!" Cid grumbled, taking a swig of his tea.

Yuffie rounded the banister and threw herself on the couch, nearly kicking Cloud in the process. Cloud barely noticed. Leon threw Riku and Namine an apologetic look for all the rudeness, but neither of them looked like they really cared. Namine took a seat in one of the armchairs. Riku contented himself to lean against the wall. Leon went back to his seat on the other couch, where his book was sitting. He picked it up and looked like he was about ready to get back into it.

"You don't clean much either!" Yuffie retorted, throwing a glare over at Cid.

Cid shrugged. "It's one thing tha' wizard did right, he set the house up to do the work we don' have time teh do!"

Yuffie agreed. She pulled out a yo-yo and began lazily playing with it.

Zack finished up his squats and pulled out a bottle of water. He downed it.

"So, you came for a fight, eh?" Zack asked, heading over to Riku and Namine.

"We—well, I, rather—need some practice fighting," Namine said. "Riku and I thought here would be a good idea."

"Of course, we ended up in that parallel universe first," Riku muttered.

"Parallel universe?" Zack asked.

"We've discussed this," Cid said.

"Forgive me for not remembering," Zack said, sarcastically.

"Let it be," Leon warned. He looked at Riku. "You sound disappointed about cross-universe travel."

"We ran into someone, less-than-pleasant," Riku said, making a disgusted face.

"Was it that Shadow thing?" Yuffie asked.

Namine and Riku both nodded.

There were multiple looks of discomfort around the room, but Cloud's grimace was certainly the most prominent.

"So back to that fight you came here for…" Zack said, changing the subject back.

"Don't tell me _you're _trying to get out of rounds," Leon said. "We don't have the people for that!"

"Like Zack would be trying to get out of a fight," Cloud scoffed.

"I'm just saying, we're down three fighters," Zack said.

"We've managed it before," Leon said.

"You're just twitchy because Rinoa's not here," Zack retorted.

Leon glared at Zack over his book.

"How many squats have you done today, Zack?" Cloud asked.

"Five-thousand, two-hundred and eighty," Zack replied.

"How many do you usually do when Aerith's here?" Cloud continued.

Zack made a face. "Usually no more than three-thousand. Sometimes less than two…"

"Nervous twitch," Yuffie coughed.

"Hey!" Zack said.

"It's slow now anyway," Yuffie said. "I don't see why it matters all that much."

"I'm su'prised _you're _no' trying to get outta rounds," Cid said, looking at Yuffie.

"How can I with _those two_ breathing down my backs every waking minute about it?" Yuffie asked, gesturing at Leon and Cloud.

"Don't drag me into this," Leon warned.

"Would you all stop fighting!" Tifa said, coming in the front door.

"Yes ma'am," Zack said.

Cloud looked back down at his tea. Leon went back to his book. Cid grunted in agreement, looking at his empty tea cup in annoyance.

"Yeah, boo—" Yuffie began.

"Yuffie!" Cloud warned.

Yuffie rolled her eyes and quieted.

"How were the rounds?" Leon asked, looking between Tifa and Zell.

"Nothing too much," Tifa said, pocketing her gloves. "It's weird."

"Calm before the storm," Cloud reiterated.

"Oh! You didn't say that Namine and Riku had stopped by!" Tifa said, seeing Riku and Namine for the first time.

"Oh, don't worry about us," Namine said, almost moving to get up. "We might be heading out so we're not intruding. We just came by to see if you guys needed any help…"

"Well, you can still stay for dinner!" Tifa offered.

"I haven' cooked anythin'!" Cid grumbled.

"I didn't expect you to!" Tifa said. "I put a casserole in the oven before Zell and I left to go on our round."

Zell laughed. "Didn't any of the rest of you notice?" he asked.

Based on everyone's reactions to his question, the answer was 'no.'

Tifa snorted and headed to the kitchen, probably to check on the casserole. Zell sat down in an empty chair around the table. Namine settled back into her own seat.

"Do you think it's gone quiet because we have less fighters here?" Leon asked, looking at Cloud.

"Are you asking me this because you genuinely want to know," Cloud said. "Or because you sincerely want me to answer 'no' so you don't feel guilty about Rinoa being here?"

Leon looked uncomfortable. He had probably been thinking about this for a while.

"I think it's a combination of things," Cloud continued, as if knowing Leon wasn't going to say anything one way or another. "I don't think it has _everything _to do with Aerith, Rinoa, Quistis and Merlin being gone."

"We have a lot of fighters on Destiny Islands, and we don't get any Heartless," Namine interjected, trying to be helpful.

"Yes, but you happen to live on one of the brightest Worlds ever," Cloud said. "So it's really no surprise that you don't get any Heartless."

"You keep saying that this is the calm before the storm," Riku said, looking at Cloud. "What do you mean by that?"

"Something's coming," Cloud said, still calmly drinking his tea.

There was a clatter in the kitchen. Tifa might have almost dropped something.

"You don't think…" she began, poking her head out of the kitchen.

The room went quiet. All eyes went to Cloud. Riku looked at Tifa. Namine closed her eyes, trying to make sense of all the images that had just flooded her head. She rummaged in her satchel for her sketchbook and some pencils.

"I wish there was a way to keep this more organized…" she muttered.

Riku looked down at her, trying to get an idea of the image she had begun drawing.

"It's not _him _is it?" Cid asked.

"I can't be sure," Cloud said, his voice gruff.

Tifa squinted her eyes closed, as if trying to get rid of an image that just wouldn't leave. Zack shifted on his feet awkwardly. Cid stared at his empty cup, swirling around the dregs of his tea aimlessly. Leon stared at his book, but his eyes didn't move because he wasn't actually reading. Yuffie suddenly became very interested in a knot in her yo-yo string. Zell looked down at his hands. Riku's eyes were on Namine's sketchbook.

The only sound in the room was Namine's pencil scratching across the page.

"He hasn't come here yet," Zack said. "Is that a good thing or a bad thing."

"It's been more than three weeks since I've been here," Cloud said quietly. "He hasn't shown up here once in that time."

"The longest we've gone without seeing him is nineteen days," Tifa said softly.

"It's been five," Cloud said.

"You guys keep track?" Zell asked.

"Tactless," Leon muttered, holding his forehead in his hand.

"You have to," Cloud said, his voice even, despite Zell's rudeness. "With something like this."

"Are we due fer another visit?" Cid asked.

Cloud didn't respond.

The room fell silent, even more so because Namine had finished the picture. She very slowly put the pencils she had used on the table and brushed away all the excess graphite. She looked over the picture solemnly.

"Has this happened yet?" she asked, holding the picture out to Cloud.

The image showed Sephiroth hovering off the ground, his sword pointed at Cloud's chest, blood dripping from the sword. Cloud stood on the ground, his sword held limply in his hand as he looked up at Sephiroth. Cloud looked like he had almost given up. Sephiroth looked smug.

Cloud shook his head slowly.

Namine winced.

"Can you be sure that this is actually going to happen?" Zack asked.

"Not necessarily," Namine said. "But, most of the time, when I draw something that hasn't happen yet, it does come true. The only thing is, I can interpret it wrong, making it seem like the outcome is different."

"How do you interpret somethin' wrong?" Cid asked.

"Well, Cloud may not actually look like he's given up, maybe he's just rearing up for another attack. Maybe Sephiroth's moment of smugness is short-lived."

"Sephiroth always looks smug," Tifa said.

"What about the blood?" Zack asked. "Does that happen?"

"I can unfortunately almost guarantee it," Namine said quietly.

"Sadly, I've seen bloodier pictures," Riku said.

Namine shot him a glare. "Now you're being tactless," she said.

He shrugged.

"Cloud?" Tifa said hesitantly. "What are you thinking? You're awfully quiet."

Cloud was staring at Namine's picture, frowning.

"Do you have a background for it?" he asked.

"I can add one," Namine said. "I didn't before because it kept changing."

"How does that work?" Zell asked.

"It does that sometimes," Namine said with a shrug. "I don't know why."

She brought her sketchbook closer to it and picked up some pencils. She began drawing a setting for the image.

"What'cha drawing?" Zack asked, peering over Namine's shoulder.

She smacked him away.

Riku moved in to get a better look.

"How come he gets to watch?" Zack asked.

Riku smirked.

"It looks like he's standing on top of a building," Zack said, before Namine swatted him away again.

"No surprise," Cloud said.

A timer went off in the kitchen.

"What a nice interruption," Tifa said. "Dinner's ready!"


	46. The Foul Stench

**Author's Note: **Kay, uploading this now because it's done and I have computer access. FYI, I had to send my computer in for diagnostics and possibly repair (probably... no, more than likely, repair.) I'm currently using a housing computer. I won't be able to post as much, that's for sure. (I probably won't write as much either, but I have written from my phone in the past and am not opposed to doing so now. Plus, there's the old-fashioned method still. Posting may be interrupted.

PLUS, my boyfriend and my friend are coming in next week. So, NOTHING IN REGARDS TO THIS FIC WILL HAPPEN. Because I can ALMOST PROMISE you that I won't be writing. And I definitely won't be posting.

Moving on, one last order of business PLEASE sign your reviews if you are reviewing anonymously. Fanfiction has changed the format for reviews several times recently and I got a couple of anonymous reviews on Can't Escape that aren't signed in any way SO I DON'T KNOW WHO POSTED THEM. I really DO care about who says what, which is why I'm asking that you sign them. I'm not mad... I'm just saying...

Anyway, that was all.

NO IT WASN'T SORRY! Also... I wrote out a very extensive FF timeline detailing the events between BBS and KH1. Do you guys want me to post it now, or should I write a couple of the major scenes and THEN post it. I don't care, I'm gonna write the scenes anyway, I just wanna know which one you want to see first.

* * *

><p>"You need your light!"<p>

xx

"Namine," Tifa urged. "Your food's going to get cold."

Namine didn't even look up from the picture that she was working on under the table while her food sat on top of it, getting cold.

"Don't even try," Riku said. "My mother doesn't even have any luck with this."

"Cloud, this is your fault!" Tifa said. "You're the one who wanted her to add a setting. Why does that even matter?"

"Trying to see if maybe I can prevent something like that happening," Cloud said. "That's my blood on his sword."

"Don't try to prevent it," Namine murmured. "You'll only ensure that it happens."

"Your blood has been on Sephiroth's masamune before," Tifa chided.

Cloud frowned.

"Aw man!" Yuffie exclaimed suddenly, interrupting any argument between Cloud and Tifa that may have having.

"Wha'?" Cid asked.

Yuffie frowned. "I hate to say this, but this casserole is _good_."

Most everyone at the table snickered.

"What's wrong with the casserole being good, Yuffie?" Leon asked, before glancing out the window, like he was waiting for something.

"It feels wrong to like food that's not Aerith's," Yuffie grumbled.

"Yeh like my soup!" Cid said.

"Yeah, but that's soup," Yuffie said. "It doesn't count."

"I put potions 'n stuff in my soup so tha'…"

"Duh," Yuffie interrupted. "That's the point. Potions taste good."

"Well, I'm glad you like my casserole," Tifa said.

"This is Aerith's recipe, isn't it?" Cloud whispered, leaning closer to Tifa.

She nodded.

"Thought so."

"There," Namine said, setting down the pencil. "Why is always raining?"

The last comment seemed to be made more to herself than anyone else.

"Rain?" Cloud asked.

Namine held up the picture to him, careful not to get it in anyone's food. Sure enough, Sephiroth and Cloud were both in the pouring rain. Rain and blood now dripped off of Sephiroth's masamune.

"What do you mean 'why is it always raining'?" Tifa asked, sounding very curious.

Namine's eyes widened. She looked to Riku.

"I don't know any more than them," he told her.

"In the other universe," Namine began. "There's this memory of Aerith's… and all I can see from it is blood and rain."

"What does that have to do with the picture you just drew?" Cloud asked.

Namine shrugged. "I… I don't know."

"What would Aerith have seen that was blood and rain?" Yuffie asked.

"I don't know," Namine said again. "I can't see the past that. She's hiding that memory for whatever reason. And I don't want to pry any farther than I already have. I didn't mean to pry in the first place…"

"Is the Aerith there like our Aerith here?" Tifa asked.

"For the most part, yeah," Namine said. "Though, she's sadder…"

This caused everyone around the table to frown a little. The thought of Aerith being sad was never a good one, even if the Aerith in question was from another universe.

"Are all of us there?" Tifa asked. "Like we are here?"

Namine shook her head.

"Aerith, Cid, Yuffie, Leon and Tifa are there," she said. "I've met them. They've also mentioned Cloud and Rinoa, though I haven't met them personally."

"I'm offended," Zell said. "No one's mentioned me."

Leon went from glancing out the window to raising an eyebrow at Zell.

"Really?" he asked.

"What about me?" Zack asked quietly.

"I… I don't know," Namine said lamely, not quite wanting to piece together what she pretty much knew about Zack. She knew he wasn't around though.

"You mean to tell me that no one mentioned me?" Zack said.

"Your name came up maybe once or twice, but no one ever said where you wer—where he was."

"Maybe that's why that Aerith is sadder," Yuffie said. "Zack's not around."

"Yeah, maybe," Zack agreed.

_It's more than that… _Namine thought to herself.

"Leon, stop looking out the window like you have a nervous twitch," Tifa said. "You've been doing it this entire meal."

Leon looked down at his plate instead.

"He's just waiting for Rinoa," Zack teased.

"They've been gone a while, that's all," Leon said quietly.

"You don't see me looking out the window for Aerith," Zack said.

"Everyone's different, Zack," Cloud said.

"You should eat," Riku said, looking at Namine.

"Right," Namine said.

She put her sketchbook and pencils away and started at her casserole.

Everyone lapsed into silence as they ate, the only sounds being the chinks of flatware on dishes. Leon snuck another glance out the window and frowned a little bit when he didn't see what he was looking for.

"You guys know about the Shadow?" Riku asked suddenly.

"What do you mean?" Yuffie asked, through a mouthful of food.

"Earlier, when we were talking about running into him, you guys seemed to know who he was."

"Oh, he came up in passing," Cloud said. "Roxas mentioned him as a parallel to Sephiroth."

"Ah," Riku said.

"He also said that Namine here is the only one that can see him," Zack said, looking over at Namine. "Is that right?"

Namine made a face, hardly looking up from her food even. "I can see a general outline of him. It's because I can see memories. I think I'm one of three people who _can _see him. More people can hear him than see him."

"He split himself from that Sora early then," Cloud said. "Sephiroth makes himself seen to everyone."

"Why do we insist on talking about things like this?" Yuffie asked.

Tifa hushed her. Yuffie made a face.

"Why is that?" Namine asked, curious. "That Sephiroth is different."

"Well, you all know why dark shadows of people exist, right?"

Everyone nodded.

"Okay, good, so I don't have to explain that," Cloud said. "Well, I think what happened in my case is that Sephiroth waited to split himself from me so that he was stronger and _could _make himself seen by everyone. It's in his personality. He likes to be seen, to be known. In this other Shadow's case, something probably made him split himself sooner. Or he really enjoys only being seen by a few people."

"How can you speak about this so matter-of-factly?" Tifa asked. "One minute you're all silent and moody and you don't want to talk about him, even say his _name! _And then next thing we all know you're talking about this so philosophically! Leon! Stop looking out the window, Rinoa's not back yet!"

Leon and Cloud were now both looking at Tifa with looks of mixed confusion and shock. Tifa clamped her hands over her mouth, as if she suddenly regretted most of what she had just said.

"Sheesh! Wha's go' inteh you?" Cid asked.

"I wasn't looking for Rinoa," Leon said. "Not this time anyway. I was noting the sudden change in weather."

Lightning flashed in the window.

Zell jumped.

Leon winced

Yuffie yelped, much to her displeasure.

Tifa squinted her eyes shut again.

Cid bit his lip.

Zack slowly put down his flatware and started to get up slowly.

Cloud growled.

Namine's eyes went wide.

Riku's nostrils flared.

"Can everyone else feel that?" Namine asked.

"The darkness," Riku said.

"Not just any darkness," Cloud said, his voice quiet once again.

"Cloud," Tifa gasped. "I'm so sorry! You know I don't usually… it's him… you know that… I'm sorry!"

Cloud raised a hand to quiet her. She winced again.

"I felt something nagging at me all afternoon and I ignored it," she continued. "It felt different. It wasn't the usual tactic."

Cloud pushed himself back from the table. Zack went with him, given the fact that they were sharing a bench. Zack seemed prepared for the moving back, he wasn't so prepared for the part where Cloud stood up rather suddenly. He fell over backwards and hit his head.

"Nnngh," he groaned, looking up.

It became really apparent why Cloud had stood up so suddenly. He was blocking Sephiroth's sword with merely his hands. The sword had very nearly come down on Cloud and Namine's heads. Namine had been thrown behind Riku in an equally sudden motion and Riku was behind Cloud with his blade bared.

Cloud grunted. Sephiroth's sword inched closer. Riku moved so he was blocking it.

"There are innocents here!" Cloud shouted in Sephiroth's face, summoning his own blade to him.

"I don't think you have the ability to call anyone in this room 'innocent'," Sephiroth said, his voice smooth and even compared to Cloud's shout. "I mean, look at them all."

He gestured his right hand around the room, pointing out each and every one of them. Zack took that opportunity to stand back up and pull out his sword. Namine pulled herself to her feet as well, only minimally shaken from being shoved back by Riku. It wasn't anything too terribly new.

"How did you get in here?" Tifa asked, glaring.

"Easy," Sephiroth said. "Someone left the back door open."

All eyes went to Zell, who flushed bright red.

"Idiot," Leon muttered.

"See?" Sephiroth said. "And you call them innocents."

"Your quarrel is with me," Cloud grunted.

"And your friends give you power," Sephiroth said. "Therefore it is to my advantage to strike at them as well."

In one, swift motion, he thrust his sword forward, flinging Riku back against a wall. Namine gasped. Riku hit the wall about halfway up, but then slid down it, groaning as he did.

"Are you okay?" Namine asked, her eyes wide.

Riku groaned. "Yup," he said, picking himself up. "That's not the first time that's happened."

Unfortunately, Namine knew that.

"Why don't you charge into battle to protect the ones you care about like he does?" Sephiroth asked, his eyes locked with Cloud's. "He jumped right into that."

"My hands blocked your sword first," Cloud said.

"But where was your sword?" Sephiroth taunted. "You should know never to be anywhere without it close by!"

"Mine's a Keyblade," Riku grunted. "It's different."

Sephiroth rolled his eyes. He didn't really care.

"What I do want to know," he said, looking at Riku now. "Is how you knew to jump in like that? It's like you knew what I was going for."

"Let me tell you something that not a lot of people know about me," Riku said. "I had a shadow too, once. He was foul and loathsome. He was the same in you in so many ways. Except he smelled. Like, he had a _stench_. You don't have that."

Yuffie giggled, but stifled it as quickly as possible.

"You were doing good there," Sephiroth said. "You actually looked like a worthy opponent for a second. But you lost it as soon as you started talking about _smells_."

"Ansem did smell," Namine whispered.

"Enough dawdling," Sephiroth said. "Back to the part where I start hitting Cloud where it hurts most."

Cloud growled.

"Now," Sephiroth murmured, jumping back gracefully so he could point his sword around the room at people without actually hitting them. "Who to hurt first?"

His sword kept switching between Tifa and Namine. Cloud and Riku were both very audibly growling by this point.

"No one," Cloud said. "Your quarrel is with _me_!"

He bared his sword at Sephiroth.

"No!" Namine shrieked.

This caused everyone to pause.

"This is how he keeps getting to you!" she said. "Because you make him fight just you. You need us by your side. You need your light to win this one! Trust me! I saw it in the other universe! I saw it in Riku! You need your light…"

Her voice caught as she finished her statement.

"Touching," Sephiroth smirked.

"Tifa, Zack, Riku," Cloud said. "Will you help me?"

"On one condition," Tifa said, determined. "We do it _outside _of Aerith's house!"


	47. For Friendship

**Author's Note:** Hello! I'm back! (Sort of.) My friend and boyfriend have left, so I'm back into a semi-regular swing of things. I'm not entirely back because I still lack a computer. My computer was supposedly fixed, but thankfully Geek Squad at Best Buy checked it and found out that it hadn't actually been fixed so they had to send it back. Awesome. Not. Let's try that again, guys. Seriously.

Anyway, the long-awaited finale to a Cloud and Sephiroth battle!

Three more chapters until the special one! Woohoo!

As August comes in, I'm going to try and start posting more often. Emphasis on the try. I'm behind rar and I want to/need to catch up.

Onto the chapter!

* * *

><p>"You got hurt!"<p>

xx

"How come Cloud picked them?" Yuffie whined, throwing herself down on the couch.

"They were closest?" Zell mused, leaning against a wall.

"No, Cloud trusts them the most," Leon said, taking a seat back on 'his' couch.

"He hardly knows Riku," Yuffie argued.

"Let me rephrase," Leon said. "Cloud trusts them the most to help him win this battle. Just like how I'm pretty sure I'm still here to ensure that people like _you _don't go interfering this time around."

"Why couldn't all of us help?" Yuffie asked.

"Because then Sephiroth would jus' run away," Cid said, sitting down in an armchair. "Not cowardly-like, but because a battle agains' nine people isn' his style if it doesn' hafta be."

There was a large _clang _outside and a shout from either Zack or Riku, they couldn't be sure.

"How did they manage to get Sephiroth outside without a fight, I wonder," Zell said.

"Riku used a star shard," Leon said. "I watched him do it. He pulled it out and launched himself at the other four."

"Aerith will be glad that they're not fighting in the house, at least," Yuffie said.

"Rinoa might be mad she missed this," Leon mused. "She's been wanting to see Cloud fight with some help."

"A' leas' he chose Tifa to help 'im," Cid said, pulling out a piece of straw to chew on. "I think it would've hur' her the mos' if he hadn'."

"Zack too," Leon said. "He would have died staying inside."

"But Riku!" Yuffie said.

"Will be an excellent aid to Cloud," Leon said. "Won't he, Namine?"

Namine hadn't really been listening. Rather, she had been drawing. She had quite the collage of images. Some were easily from the battle going on outside. Others were a little bit more abstract. She wasn't sure what the picture of Aerith looking up to the sky was for…

"Namine?" Leon repeated.

"Pardon?"

"I asked if Riku would be a good aid to Cloud, I'm assuming he will be."

"Of course! Riku's rather angry at Sephiroth at the moment. Mostly because of the sword over my head thing. Let's just hope Riku doesn't let the anger go to his head. He does that sometimes."

She went back to a picture of Cloud and Zack standing back to back.

"So, how is it that your pictures can predict the future?" Zell asked.

Namine chewed on the end of her pencil. "I'm not entirely sure how to explain it," she said. "Like, when I see memories from the past, it's easily explained because that's what I do: I see memories. But how that translates to the pictures I draw showing the future…"

"It is curious, that I'll admit," Leon said.

"I've always been able to do it," Namine said. "I was able to draw things that happened in Castle Oblivion before they happened. I knew what was going to happen with Sora and the Riku Replica in the end. Well, I didn't predict the Riku Replica ending up in another universe, but I feel like that's an extenuating circumstance."

"Maybe it's just something that you do," Yuffie said. "Aerith _does _weird stuff. So do Rinoa and Tifa and Leon."

"Oh, so I don't do weird stuff?" Zell asked.

"Can it," Cid grunted.

"You're just weird," Yuffie replied.

"Maybe," Namine thought. "At first I thought that I could just predict what was going on in Castle Oblivion for Sora and the Riku Replica because I was sort of creating their futures as we went along. But now I can just do it with everyone."

"How often does it happen?" Leon asked.

"Not all that often. Most of the time it's something that's close-coming. Sometimes the event is significant, sometimes not."

"Maybe it's 'cause yeh can see ev'ryone's memories," Cid said. "Tha' causes yeh to get an idea of wha's comin' in the future."

"That would make sense," Namine said. "If I can get an idea of what's going on for two separate people, then it seems an easy jump for me to gather what those two people's future holds, assuming their paths cross."

"You lost me," Yuffie said.

"It makes sense to me," Namine said. "Though, whether or not that's actually the reason is something that I don't think anyone knows. Nor probably will know."

And with that, she went back to her drawing.

xx

"You are like bothersome fleas with your pitiful attempts to overpower me," Sephiroth said, standing loftily on top of a building. This gave him the vantage point he wanted. He was looking down on everyone else.

Cloud and Tifa had rather angry glares aimed at Sephiroth. Riku just looked menacing. Zack's face was rather unreadable. He just looked like he wanted to fight, really.

"However," Sephiroth continued. "I find it interesting that Cloud allowed his friends to fight this time. Usually, he's rather against that."

Cloud growled. Tifa looked like she was actually considering spitting in Sephiroth's direction.

"We've been trying to get him to let us help him for months," Zack said.

"Zack," Cloud hissed. "Don't respond to his baits. It'll make it harder on the rest of us in the long run if you do."

"Oh," Zack said, looking rather sheepish now. "Sorry."

Cloud made a gesture saying: 'don't worry about it.'

"It seems that everyone's motivations here are clear," Sephiroth said. "Cloud wants to be rid of me. Tifa wants Cloud to be rid of me. Zack is purely looking for a fight. However, Riku, here, I do not understand. Why are you here? What is your quarrel with me?"

"You nearly hurt Namine. I don't like people who do that," Riku said, taking a rather aggressive fighting stance.

"Surely that is not _all _of it?" Sephiroth taunted. "Surely there is some other thing that brings you here."

"Riku," Cloud cautioned. "Don't let him get to you."

"Oh he won't," Riku said, looking at Cloud. "Trust me. I've seen worse. I don't particularly _like _dark shadows." He turned to Sephiroth as he said this. "I had one of my own once. It took the form of Ansem, Xehanort's Heartless. I could have _certainly _lived without him. However, because of him, I am stronger today."

Riku paused for a second, thinking about something, and then laughed. "Heh, I'm rambling. Anyway, I've already dealt with one shadow of a person today. I don't really want to deal with another!"

"Hmmph," Sephiroth grunted.

He may have started to say something else, but he was interrupted. Zack had taken advantage of Sephiroth's distraction and had launched an attack on him.

For three, brilliant seconds, Sephiroth wasn't composed. He was startled, and he was also flat on his back. He didn't even splutter though. One second, he was on the ground (building), the next, he was several feet above even that, looking at Zack very angrily.

"How dare you," he said.

"How dare I what?" Zack asked. "Are you going to tell me that it's dishonorable to strike you while you're distracted? Please. You're only a soldier in your dreams."

Sephiroth looked taken aback.

"Boost please," Tifa said, looking over at Cloud. "If I don't get to him, I'll help you on your way up."

Cloud lowered his sword to give her a lift. She hopped up onto it and he threw her into the air. Sephiroth caught sight of her just as she was about to punch him in the face. He flew up further. She grimaced and made her way to a nearby ledge to perch on. She took a battle stance.

"You're the one who needs to hit him," Riku said, only looking at Cloud out of the corner of his eye. "But let me do what Tifa did."

Cloud nodded and lowered his sword again.

Riku smirked.

"Not necessary."

Using Dark Firaga as his only boost, Riku propelled himself up the building.

"Effective as always," he said, standing next to Zack. Zack actually looked mildly impressed. Riku jumped up to the ledge that Tifa was on, flashed her a rather cocky grin, then jumped one more ledge up.

Each time he jumped up, Sephiroth just hovered higher and higher. He laughed.

"None of you can reach me," he said. "I don't know why you keep trying."

"You don't get it do you," Riku said. "You don't understand what it's like to have people by your side."

"And, therefore," Cloud continued. "You don't know how to prepare against it."

Cloud launched himself up with no apparent boost. Zack reached out his hand at the exact right moment and Cloud latched onto it. Zack threw Cloud up farther. Cloud smirked. Tifa mimicked Zack's actions.

Sephiroth flew up higher. But warily, as if he wasn't entirely sure about what was going on. He didn't want to fly up too high to make it look like he was being a coward. But, he didn't want Cloud to get him…

Cloud had grasped Riku's arm by now. Riku tossed Cloud up. Cloud raised his sword. He hovered even with Sephiroth for a brief second. He then brought his sword down on Sephiroth, knocking him back down to that building. Tifa propelled herself downwards and landed a good kick in Sephiroth's face.

Sephiroth didn't even make a sound in protest. He was too proud.

Cloud stood next to Sephiroth and grimly raised his sword.

Sephiroth laughed. "You know it can't end like this," he said.

"Why not?" Cloud said. "It's time you become a memory."

"Not yet."

Tifa screamed.

Riku swore. He and Zack jumped down to the building that the others were on.

Sephiroth was now standing and Tifa had crumpled to the ground in pain. Dark tendrils surrounded her body like chains. She struggled to get out of them, but that only made them worse. Realizing this, she stopped struggling, even though she didn't want to give Sephiroth that satisfaction. Her sense of self-preservation was just a little bit higher than her pride in that very moment.

"Take me down and she'll go down with me," Sephiroth said.

"Please tell me he's bluffing," Zack muttered.

"I can't be sure," Riku said.

Cloud lowered his sword angrily.

"Let her go," he demanded.

Sephiroth smirked.

"Kill him," Tifa said.

"I can't…" Cloud said, sounding defeated. "I can't risk losing you…"

The look Cloud was giving Tifa was a mixture of fear and pain.

"Don't pick now to realize this," Zack muttered.

Cloud didn't hear to ask what 'this' meant.

Sephiroth laughed. "You parade that your friends are your power, but they can also be your greatest weakness."

Riku dropped down to a crouch, he slowly moved in between Tifa and Sephiroth.

"What do you think you're doing, boy?" Sephiroth asked, turning his glare to Riku instead of Cloud.

Riku didn't respond. He only reached over and grabbed the tendril that was around Tifa's neck. He began to pry it off, hissing as the darkness burned his skin.

Sephiroth glowered at Riku and sent out more tendrils to snatch Riku's hands away. Riku fought them, continuing to pull on the threads around Tifa. He wasn't giving up. Since he could pull at the darkness, he might as well help Tifa out.

Cloud began fiddling with his sword, searching for one specific piece of it. He pulled out one of the side blades. Zack watched him with interest.

"Tifa," Riku whispered, shaking off a tendril destined for him. "I can feel your light, can you give me a hand with it?"

With Sephiroth focused so clearly on Riku, Cloud raised the side blade, his face determined.

"Oh shi—" Zack mouthed.

Cloud drove the side blade through Sephiroth's gut, in the one place that his armor didn't cover.

Sephiroth doubled over, but not before Cloud pulled his blade out.

To everyone's surprise, Sephiroth laughed.

"Your anger," he said. "This is good!"

The tendrils around Tifa began to waver, but this wasn't entirely because Sephiroth had just taken a major hit to the concentration. Tifa was fighting back with her light.

Sephiroth wrapped his wing around him, looking up at Cloud for a brief second, a sly smirk on his face. Then he disappeared, leaving only a single, black feather behind. Zack saw fit to touch the tip of his sword to it and light it on fire.

The tendrils around Tifa disappeared entirely and there was an awkward scramble of movement as Riku caught her but then hastily moved her over to Cloud as he dove down to see to Tifa. Riku brushed at his arms, as if trying to bat away invisible darkness tendrils that were still grabbing onto him.

"Tifa," he said, his voice only a hoarse whisper. "This is exactly why I didn't want you guys to help! You got hurt!"

"Cloud," Tifa said, looking up at him. "You still need us to fight with you."

She rested her head on his chest. Cloud didn't say anything else.


	48. Eternal Moments

**Author's Note: **Hey, so, chapter! I meant to have this up yesterday... but I was too busy purchasing books for school and dealing with my bank. (The lack of computer is doing nothing but keeping me from being online at ridiculous hours of the night and therefore, getting s*** done. Grarg.

Anyway, I'm swapping two chapters. The chapter that should be getting posted now based on how it's written out in the document is being pushed back one chapter in favor of this chapter instead. It really doesn't matter because they both happen simultaneously, I'm just posting THIS chapter now in order to start posting the crossover I have with rar sooner. Yay!

Last order of business, I REALLY AM trying to get stuff posted sooner. I have a whole calendar set up through the month of August where I should have SOME activity related to my fic EVERY DAY. Whether I'm posting here on fanfic, porting over to dA, or blogging, I will be making a SERIOUS EFFORT to do stuff EVERY DAY. Obviously, that isn't ALWAYS going to happen, I'm moving twice during that time period. But I can dream.

And, with all of that, the chapter.

* * *

><p>"Just the two of us..."<p>

xx

Both Kairi and Xion's Keyblades shone greatly with Light. The Light elongated the blades, making them stronger and more powerful. The two of them sliced through Nobodies with ease, fighting back-to-back. There was a steady lack of Nobodies in their perimeter, given that no Nobody could stand up to the power of their combo. As their combo finished, they raised their Keyblades in the air, twirling them about. Magically, their Keyblades did not clash. In tandem, Kairi and Xion slammed their Keyblades into the ground, emitting a shockwave that destroyed even more Nobodies and left the ones that weren't destroyed heavily wounded and reeling.

Sora and Roxas saw fit to take care of the rest of the Nobodies in the area.

"What _was _that?" Roxas asked, his eyes wide.

"It's called Bladecharge," Xion replied. "It's a combo that Aqua gave us."

"You ran into Aqua?" Sora asked, banishing Oathkeeper. It felt awkward in his left hand.

Kairi and Xion nodded.

"We helped them seal the Keyhole in Twilight Town," Kairi said.

"How come you two get to have all the adventures?" Roxas asked.

"Chill!" Xion said. "It was nothing major."

"Tell me about the combo thing," Sora said, changing the subject.

Kairi pulled the rest of the charms out of her pocket. "It's one for each Command Style," she explained. "I asked her if she could teach us how to do Command Styles, but she said she couldn't. In return, she made us charms for combo-versions of them."

"That seems pretty sweet," Sora said. "How do they work?"

Kairi and Xion explained to Sora and Roxas what Aqua had told them about the combo charms. Roxas and Sora got excited.

"Can we test out another one?" Roxas said. "Kairi and I don't have a combo yet."

Kairi laughed. "Sure thing, but we need to find another batch of Nobodies first!"

It didn't take long to find another batch of Nobodies, not in the Castle that Never Was. Roxas navigated the place with ease and knew where every spot the Nobodies would arrive was.

Kairi once again pulled the charms out of her pocket while Sora and Xion distracted the Nobodies. (At the moment, it was only a few Dusks; though Roxas was certain that they'd get some Creepers and Berserkers if they stuck around long enough.)

"Which one do you want?" Kairi asked.

"Do you know which one does what?" Roxas asked.

Kairi shook her head.

Roxas frowned in thought. "That one," he said, pointing to an icy-blue one.

Kairi pocketed the rest of the charms and she and Roxas activated the one he had selected. Instantly, the two of them felt a surge in speed. A bunch of Berserkers showed up as if on cue. Kairi and Roxas launched into attacks. Their attacks were now coated with everything Blizzard. The combos were immense. Roxas was able to summon three ice pillars that spun about the battlefield with great speed, destroying everything in their paths. After a bit of concentration, Kairi was able to summon the pillars as well. As the combo reached a close, Kairi and Roxas put their Keyblades together and summoned a giant ice block. Sora and Xion instinctively ducked out of the way. The glacier didn't touch Kairi or Roxas, but it did destroy all but one Berserker. Without even hesitating, Roxas went after the Berserker and destroyed it as well.

"That was so cool!" he exclaimed.

Kairi nodded in agreement.

"Do you think Xion and I could try one?" Sora asked.

"Sure, why not?" Xion answered.

Kairi pulled out the charms and handed them to Xion to offer to Sora.

"That one," Sora said, pointing to a light blue one with no hesitation.

"Time to find some more Nobodies," Roxas sang, starting off in a different direction of the Castle.

"Don't touch it just yet," Xion said, pocketing the charms. "I wouldn't want to activate a combo for no reason."

"Fair enough," Sora said, taking off after Roxas.

Xion and Kairi followed behind.

"Bleh, Gamblers," Sora muttered more Nobodies showed up. "I hate these things."

"No better time for a combo, then," Xion said, offering out the charm he'd selected.

Sora grabbed onto the charm as well and the two of them activated it.

Like Roxas and Kairi, they were given a burst of speed and power. They lashed out into the Gamblers, releasing rapid four-hit combos with spin-attack finishers. The Gamblers didn't even have a chance to unleash any of their usual attacks. Kairi and Roxas decided to just stay out of the way for the most part and let Sora and Xion perform their combo. Roxas tossed his Keyblade into the fray a couple of times and Kairi shot off a few level one spells. Sora and Xion timed it right so that the final finisher (a massive four-hit combo a piece, both ending with light attacks) finished off all of the Gamblers.

"That wasn't so bad," Sora said, grinning.

"Does anyone else want to use one?" Xion asked. "Sora and Kairi? Or maybe Sora and Roxas?"

The other three shook their heads.

"Roxas and I already have a pretty cool combo. So do Kairi and I," Sora said.

"We should practice that," Kairi said.

"Yeah," Sora said, scratching the back of his neck. "We probably should."

"Here, let me take the charms back, then," Kairi said, looking at Xion.

"What, you don't trust me with them?" Xion asked, her voice halfway teasing.

"Your pockets are all magicky. Just let me hang onto them, all right?"

Xion rolled her eyes. "Okay."

Xion dug the remaining charms out of her pocket and gave them to Kairi. However, as she was doing so, the pinky-purple charm brightened as it activated.

"They're not supposed to do that!" Kairi said.

"It doesn't matter, we just activated another one," Xion replied.

"Stop worrying about that," Roxas said. "We've got trouble!"

"Dragoon!" Sora spat.

Kairi and Xion looked at each other and both nodded in determination. Light surrounded the two girls, causing them to hover just a tad. They didn't hover completely, they just became rather light on their feet. Their Keyblades, however, actually did hover away from them. Kairi frowned at hers and moved her hand. Destiny's Embrace moved with it, still under her control. Kairi grinned and sent her Keyblade after the Dragoon with grace. Xion watched Kairi's actions and mirrored them. The Keyblades attacked the Dragoon with vigor and grace, allowing Kairi and Xion to stand just back enough to avoid the Dragoon's attacks. After every four hits or so, Kairi and Xion were able to let loose a ball of light, dealing heavy damage to the Dragoon.

"Darn your heart of pure light," Xion shouted. "Your light attacks are bigger than mine."

"Are you really going to complain?" Kairi asked.

"No, not really," Xion replied. "Not about that. I will complain that Sora and Roxas aren't helping though."

Sora and Roxas looked guiltily at each other and promptly launched into Magic Hour+.

"You know," Sora called out. "These things are a lot easier to manage when there's four people against them instead of two."

"Are you saying that we couldn't handle ourselves back at Castle Oblivion?" Kairi asked.

"No, not entirely," Sora said. "I'm just saying that this is easier."

"You're fighting with your right hand," Kairi said.

Sora groaned and switched hands. Roxas and Xion both laughed.

Kairi and Xion and Roxas and Sora let loose their finishers at the same time. Roxas and Sora sent out five pillars of light apiece, aiming them all at the Dragoon. Kairi and Xion became pillars of light, essentially. They spun about, letting loose both light and pure magic.

The Dragoon didn't survive both finishers.

"Well, that was fun," Kairi said.

"Shall we continue?" Sora asked.

"You and I still have a combo to practice," Kairi reminded him.

"That we do," Sora replied. "But there's one problem."

"What?"

"It requires me to fight right-handed," Sora said sheepishly.

Kairi frowned.

"Kairi could just fight left-handed," Xion said. "I do it all the time."

"Not everyone is ambidextrous like you, Xion," Roxas said.

Xion shrugged.

"Maybe we can just work on it another time," Kairi said sullenly.

"Maybe you should just let me fight right-handed," Sora replied.

"I wasn't the one who told you that you couldn't! Tifa said so! And she's the expert on hand injuries…"

"Just this once?" Sora asked.

"But it wouldn't be 'just this once'," Kairi said. "I know you fight with your right hand very frequently. You do it every time you dual-wield, as well as every time you're not consciously thinking about fighting with your left hand."

"Maybe we should quit the combo practice for now," Xion mused.

"Yeah, maybe let's all just go get ice cream and call it a day," Roxas added.

"Does it really matter all that much? My wrist feels fine!"

"But what if there's long-term damage?"

"I think I have more important things to worry about than wrist trouble."

"Like what?"

"You know what," Xion said. "On second thought, Roxas and I are just going to go have ice-cream. You two can join us when you get this sorted out."

Before Sora or Kairi could say anything, Roxas reached out and grabbed Xion's hand and activated the star shard. The two of them were gone in seconds.

"Like what?" Kairi repeated, her voice cracking.

"Like the darkness that I feel building up inside of me every time I use too much power. It doesn't happen with light attacks… but with every other attack I do that's powerful, I feel the darkness rise up inside of me. I can feel the monster of anti-form come out… blind rage and power. That's why I came here with Roxas in the first place: to spam Final Form until the darkness subsided. That's the only way I know how to get rid of it. It's either I do that, or I let myself be consumed by the darkness temporarily as it lets itself out. But I'm afraid… I'm afraid that one day that won't be enough…"

"Sora," Kairi said. "Why didn't you say something sooner?"

"I didn't want to worry you," Sora said sheepishly. "I'm supposed to be the person training you, protecting you. I'm not supposed to worry you with my own problems."

Kairi rolled her eyes. "Sure, you may be my trainer, and trainers aren't supposed to worry their students with their problems. But, Sora, you are also my boyfriend. And boyfriends are allowed to tell their girlfriends what's troubling them."

Sora looked down at his shoes, flushing.

Kairi closed the distance between them and hugged him. Sora gratefully put his arms around her as well.

"Sora, I am practically pure light," Kairi whispered. "I won't let you fall into darkness."

Sora gave a half-smile.

"Remember that time when you were a Heartless?"

"Yeah."

"Remember how I brought you back, then?"

"Yeah."

"I'll do that again if I have to. I'll always be there for you."

"Thanks, Kairi."

The two of them pulled apart from each other, looking each other eye-to-eye.

"Have you talked to King Mickey about this? Or Master Yen Sid? Or even Aerith?"

"No…"

"You are such a guy!" Kairi exclaimed, slapping him on the arm. "Maybe you should!"

"Yeah, probably."

Kairi rolled her eyes.

They were interrupted momentarily by a bunch of Samurais appearing.

"I don't have time for this," Kairi said, rather matter-of-factly.

She summoned her Keyblade and almost lazily pointed it at the group of Samurais.

"Holy," she said.

The usual burst of light erupted from her Keyblade, destroying all of the Samurais.

"Holy is right," Sora said as Kairi banished her Keyblade.

She grinned.

Sora cupped her face in his hands. He leaned in and kissed her.

"I love you," he said.

"I love you, too."

"Promise you'll keep me from the darkness?"

"Promise you'll protect me from everything else?"

They laughed and kissed once more.

"So, maybe we should go join Roxas and Xion, now," Sora said.

"Yeah," Kairi said absentmindedly. "Or we could go get ice cream somewhere else, just the two of us."

Sora's eyes lit up.

"I like that idea."


	49. Sunset Horizons

**Author's Note: **Okay, so remember the last chapter that I posted in Betwixt and Between that I said I swapped with another chapter? This was it. I pushed this one back in favor of that other one so I could get Kairi into Olympus Coliseum faster for Can't Escape. It doesn't actually mean I got her there faster, since this chapter and chapter 48 in BB happen at the same time in the stupidtimeline, but it makes more sense for you guys.

Um... not much else to say on this chapter. Keep an eye on the blogs, there's been a lot of activity on them lately.

Special chapter 50 is next!

* * *

><p>"Where did you <em>get <em>that?"

xx

Axel sat on the Clocktower, absentmindedly eating an ice cream. He hadn't seen Kuin since the day before, when he had crashed (sort of) that meeting at Disney Castle. He hadn't stopped the meeting, he had just made things awkward. He hoped that Kuin would actually come find him like she said she would.

Of course, he wouldn't be surprised if she had lied. He'd give her a day or two and then maybe he'd go after her.

Or maybe he wouldn't. Maybe chasing after her was just a waste of his time. Maybe she was leading him on.

But she had seemed so…

He couldn't place what she seemed like.

He looked down at his now empty ice cream stick and thought for a couple of seconds as to why it was already gone. He sighed. He always ate more, faster when he was thinking about things.

He couldn't understand why he was so captivated by her…

But he also couldn't think about stopping following her…

Girls.

"Who am I, Roxas?" he muttered to himself.

"Do you ever do anything?" came a familiar voice.

He looked up to see Kuin standing there next to him, perched daintily on the edge of the stone edge. He hadn't even heard her show up—though, he knew that her glider was silent, and so were her steps. Therefore, he shouldn't be surprised.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "I do loads of things!"

"You seem to just sit around a lot," she mused, sitting down next to him.

"There's not a lot _to _do," he said with a shrug. "Everyone else goes out looking for trouble for training purposes. I'm not training to be a master of anything."

Kuin made an agreeing gesture, but did not provide any witty comeback.

"I see you found me," Axel said, lamely.

"Wasn't too hard," Kuin replied. "You like this spot a lot."

"That is true," Axel said. "I do like this spot. It's where me and my friends would meet after long days of work in the Organization."

"Who were your friends?" Kuin asked.

"Don't you already know?" Axel asked, raising an eyebrow. "You seem to have read up on all of my files."

"I couldn't make sense of everything," Kuin replied. "Not without context."

Axel rolled his eyes. "My closest friends are Roxas and Xion. They're who I'm referring to."

"How is it that Roxas and Sora can exist simultaneously?" Kuin asked.

"Where did _that _come from?"

She shrugged. "Like I said, I saw a lot of things; I couldn't make sense of everything."

"It's complicated," Axel said, trying to brush it off.

"Please try to explain; I feel like I'm out of the loop with how the world is working now."

Axel blinked at her, unsure of what to say. Usually, Kuin was Miss-Know-It-All. Yet, here she was, admitting that she wasn't sure of something, didn't know something, whatever. It was… different.

"I feel like I should be reveling in this moment," Axel said. "You're admitting to not knowing something!"

Kuin glared at him. "Don't get used to it."

Axel frowned. "Well, it _is _complicated."

"Try to explain."

"Long story short," Axel said, _really _not wanting to explain the weirdness of Sora's heart that he barely even grasped (or cared about) himself. "Roxas and Sora share the same base of a heart, but there's a program that one of the Vexen Replicas came up with that allowed them to separate themselves. So, now they're separated."

"That doesn't seem too complicated at all," Kuin said.

Axel shrugged. "It seemed more complicated when I was there. But maybe that's because I had both Kairi and Namine yammering at me."

"Namine's the girl who is always drawing, isn't she?"

Axel nodded. "She's to Kairi as Roxas is to Sora," he said. "Let's just get that fact out of the way. Xion's a Replica, and Riku's just some cocky kid who holds them all together."

"And what are you?"

"The seventh wheel."

Kuin snorted.

"What!?" Axel asked. "They're all coupled off!"

Kuin laughed.

Axel glared.

That didn't stop Kuin from laughing.

"Let's talk about something else," Axel insisted.

"Like what?"

"Like that meeting you were just at," Axel said, bringing up that particular subject on the spot. He was only actually mildly interested in the outcome of that meeting. It didn't really involve him. Though, if he was going to continue being involved with Kuin, the outcome of that meeting probably did involve him to some degree.

"What about the meeting?" Kuin asked.

"Did you guys decide on some magical barrier to the darkness? Or whatever it was you were trying to do."

"We weren't trying to make a barrier to keep the darkness out," Kuin said, shaking her head. She looked like she was almost biting back laughter, like she thought his question was stupid. "We were trying to come up with a way to get the darkness back to a point where it's in an even balance with the light. King Mickey is attempting to find a magical way to do that. That's why he called us all there…"

"Is there a magical way to do that?"

"Not one that can be accomplished at the moment."

"Even between all of you in that room?"

"Our magics aren't entirely compatible for the large-capacity-spell that it would take to beat the darkness back in one single spell. We haven't been able to figure out anything else that would work."

"Fighting the darkness isn't simple."

"You don't have to tell me that."

"Maybe we should just do it the hard way and fight back outbursts of darkness on individual Worlds."

"That's what's been decided that we do for now. We'll keep holding meetings periodically for updates and maybe someone will have come up with a better fix. I'm supposed to be thinking of possibilities myself."

She shrugged.

"You sound so thrilled by that idea."

"My job for my entire life has been to keep the balance—the hard way. I don't honestly think that there's a simple, magical solution to this."

Axel shrugged, pretty much agreeing with her.

"What is your magic? If you don't mind me asking. You'd have to have some sort of powerful magic to be invited to that meeting."

"My magic is part of my birthright—which is on the list of things that we don't talk about."

Axel sighed. "Naturally," he muttered.

"Let's talk about how we're supposed to be keeping the balance the hard way," Kuin said. "And how you don't do anything!"

"Is the darkness really that bad?" Axel asked. "Have I just been out of it, lately? I mean, come on, with a thousand-and-one Keyblade Wielders out there, I would think it's not too much of a problem."

Kuin frowned. "Keyblade Wielders, that's another one of my problems."

"What's wrong with them?" Axel said with a bit of a glare. "Nearly all of my friends wield a Keyblade, and I don't take to kindly to other people messing with my friends."

"I won't mess with them," Kuin said, matter-of-factly. "However, I just don't know how I feel about the Keyblade."

"Explain."

"Xehanort wielded one. So they can't all be good."

Axel snorted. "So just because one big baddy wielded a particular weapon, you're going to hate on everyone who wields the same weapon?"

Kuin pursed her lips. "Petty, I know. Plus, it goes back to the fact that I've been keeping the balance by myself while the Keyblade wasn't around! Or, at least, not prominent. The last dozen years have not been easy for me."

"I would have a lot more sympathy for you if I knew what exactly it is you did and who exactly you were."

"That is on the list of things that we don't talk about," Kuin replied curtly. "You know that it's my job to fight for the balance. And that Xehanort didn't like that, so he destroyed all of my people. That's all you really need to know."

"Sorry," Axel said. "Forgive my curiosity."

"There's nothing wrong with being curious," Kuin said, looking off into the sunset. "But there are just some things about me that I would prefer stayed secrets."

"Are there things about you that you don't mind if you share?" Axel asked. "This friendship won't last if we keep keeping secrets. Trust me, I know from experience."

Kuin pursed her lips, thinking. She pushed up her sleeve, revealing a tattoo of a thorny vine, snaking around her wrist like a bracelet. However, it seemed to be living—for it was moving ever-so-slightly. Like it was taking breaths, despite the fact that plants don't breathe.

"It's more of a birthmark, really," she said. "Since I was actually born with it. All of my people were. It's the only tattoo I didn't choose to have."

"What's the significance?"

"See the thorns? They change, depending on how much work I have to do. The more thorns, the more work. The less thorns, the less work."

Axel raised an eyebrow, but nothing more.

"I expected more surprise out of you," Kuin said, sounding a tad surprised herself at his lack of surprise.

"I've seen a lot of stuff over the years," he said with a shrug. "So it just changes?"

She nodded.

"Would you say that's a lot of thorns, or no?"

She looked at her wrist, studying it.

"I'd say it's a moderate amount."

"Interesting."

She shrugged.

"What other tattoos do you have? Since you have to have more, saying that this is the only tattoo you didn't choose to have."

Kuin lowered her sleeve. She pulled her hair off of her ear.

"My mother's name," she said, revealing the characters. "My father's name is behind my other ear."

Axel nodded in acknowledgement.

"I have others, but all of them are hidden by clothing."

Axel raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything.

"What about you?" she asked. "Don't you have things about yourself that you're willing to share?"

"Well," Axel said with a sigh. "Since we're on the subject of tattoos."

He pulled up his own sleeve, showing a Nobody insignia with the number "VIII" below it on his left forearm.

"Wish I could forget this one," he said. "Got it upon joining the Organization. Stupidest decision of my life."

"Joining the Organization? Or getting the tattoo?"

"Getting the tattoo. The Organization led to _some _good things."

He lowered his sleeve and turned to mirror the actions with his other arm. He raised up _that _sleeve, revealing a pair of flaming chakrams and the name 'Axel' written in similar flames underneath.

"This one I don't regret," he said with a smile. "I got it when Isa got his. Except, his was a claymore and a crescent moon and said Saix…"

"Isa," Kuin said, testing the name on her tongue. "Tell me about him."

Axel wrinkled up his nose.

"Can we put him on the list of things not talked about? At least for today? I don't really want to talk about him today…"

Kuin shrugged. "I suppose you can. I can't really tell you that you have to tell me everything when I refuse to tell you everything."

"Good," Axel said. "I'll tell you about him one day, but not today."

Kuin smiled. "So, do you have any other tattoos?"

Axel grinned. "Oh, a few. But they're all covered by clothing."

Kuin raised an eyebrow.

Axel pulled out a sea-salt ice cream. "Want it?" he asked.

"Where did you _get _that?"


	50. OopsyDaisy

**Author's Note:**Shame me. I'm late. This should have been posted on Friday and it is now Sunday and I'm just now putting it through the Doc Manager on fanfic. Yup. Shame me. However, here is the special chapter 50. It's like, the length of three chapters, so maybe that makes up for it being late. I moved back down for school (which starts tomorrow for me). My apartment is nice, my roommates are pretty cool. I'm still in the process of settling in and all that jazz. (No where near all the way unpacked...) I'll get there. No idea what my schedule is going to look like... I'll know better in a couple of weeks. Bear with me please!

* * *

><p>Magik: I'm sure you know why I brought you three here.<p>

Kairi: No, not really…

Riku: Would you like to tell us?

Namine: I have an idea I know what this is about…

Riku: And you didn't tell me?

Namine: *shrugs* You didn't ask.

Magik: Namine, since you have an idea, why don't you go ahead and share that.

Namine: Well, isn't this about the Q and A thing you've been advertising?

Magik: Yup.

Kairi: But why is it just the three of us? Aren't there questions for everybody?

Magik: Yup. But I can't control you all in one room. So I'm splitting you off into groups.

Riku: Let me guess, we're the guinea pigs.

Magik: Right!

Riku: Oh boy.

Namine: *pats him on the shoulder* It'll be okay.

Kairi: Do we get chairs?

*a couch appears*

Kairi: That'll work. *sits down on one end of couch*

*Riku sits down on other end, Namine sits down in the middle*

*director's chair appears, Magik sits down*

Riku: Let's get this over with.

Namine: Oh come on, this could be fun!

Riku: *doesn't seem convinced*

Magik: So, first question is for Riku… asked by psychicshipping: 'Why are you so namby-pamby about using darkness?'

Riku: *splutters* Excuse me?

*Namine and Kairi giggle*

Riku: Namby-pamby! What's _that _supposed to mean?

Namine: Why are you so reluctant to…

Riku: Not what I meant… I'm not… I just choose not to…

Kairi: Use your words…

Riku: *glares*

*Namine puts a hand on Riku's shoulder comfortingly*

Riku: *sighs* It's not like I'm reluctant to use the darkness… it's just that I choose not to use it because of the damage it can do to my heart. I've had enough of that, thank you.

*Riku sits back in seat, not going to say anymore*

Magik: Right then, next question… Kairi! Also from pshychicshipping: 'What does it feel to be kidnappee-in-chief?'

Kairi: Does this have something to do with me always getting kidnapped?

Riku: That would be what it sounds like…

Kairi: Well, I haven't been kidnapped since Xehanort was around. I really think that was just a ploy of his to get to Sora.

Namine: Basically, she's saying that she doesn't feel that such a title fits her anymore.

Kairi: Yeah, pretty much.

Magik: Okay… next question then… Namine! Again, from pshychicshipping, 'why didn't you ever tell DiZ to stuff it?'

Namine: Um… well… to be completely honest, I was too afraid. He could have ordered Riku to kill me at any time…

Riku: He did order me to do that.

Namine: Yeah, well, you didn't.

*Riku and Namine spend a moment just looking at each other, Kairi looks pointedly the other way*

Magik: *clears throat*

Namine: Anyway! I was just afraid for my own life, so I never told DiZ anything of that sort… If he were saying such things now, I wouldn't even bother to listen. But we're both different people now, I feel.

Riku: Yeah, but he's still in the Realm of Darkness.

Namine: *shrug* That's his prerogative.

Magik: Okay, well, this next question is for Riku again. From Flightfoot: 'Has anyone ever walked into you and Namine in an embarrassing situation that wasn't what it looked like?'

*Riku and Namine look at each other. Namine's eyes widen. Riku just looks confused*

Kairi: You can't _seriously _mean that this has never happened!

Riku: What!? We haven't _done _anything…

Kairi: You can't be serious! Like… really?

Namine: Do you mean to tell me that you and Sora _have?_

Kairi: *looking instantly flustered* That's not what I meant!

Namine: *concentrates*

Kairi: Don't you _dare _look through my memories!

Namine: *frowns* Fine, I won't. But I still may not let you live this down…

Kairi: *blushes*

Magik: *chuckling* Well, this question is for Namine. From KKBeckett: 'How gross is Shad's mind?'

Namine: *makes disgusted face* I wouldn't call it gross, per-say. Rather, it's just filled with not-quite-right things. Granted, it is pretty gross when he starts thinking about the Kairi in that universe…not that he's always thinking gross things about her… but like… ew… I just… I can't explain it…

Kairi: Do I want to know?

Namine: No, no you don't.

Magik: Welp, that was interesting. Another question for Riku! From KKBeckett: 'What was it like growing up with Sora and Kairi?'

Riku: I don't understand what the question means.

Namine: I think it means 'what was it like growing up with the couple that is Sora and Kairi?'

Riku: There are so many levels to this… because, first you have to consider that Sora and I _always _competed over everything. Then Kairi came along and she kind of competed too, but it was different… especially because Sora and I competed _for _her for a bit there. But, I mean… It became rather obvious that Kairi had a thing for Sora… so… I dunno… *becomes flustered* I don't know where I'm going with this…

Namine: How about we move on?  
>Kairi: *whispers* You're not jealous, are you?<p>

Namine: Kairi, in a sense, I am you… so, don't worry about it.

Kairi: Oh, yeah, I suppose that's true.

Magik: Shall we move on, then?

Riku: Yes, please.

Magik: Question for Namine and Kairi, from KKBeckett: 'Does your telepathy ever get awkward?'

Namine and Kairi: *look at each other*

Magik: Answer it out loud please, for the benefit of the rest of us.

Kairi: No… not really.

Namine: I just tune her out when her and Sora are doing stuff.

Kairi: I just tune her out when her and Riku are together.

Namine: You're not tuning me out now…

Kairi: You know what I mean.

Riku: So, basically, it's just not awkward for the two of you.

Kairi and Namine: *shake heads no*

Riku: You two are so weird.

Magik: Next question then, I suppose. Also from KKBeckett, to Riku and Namine:

*Riku and Namine perk up*

Magik: 'Since you two are the only ones who haven't kissed yet, why the freak have you not?' Direct quote.

*Riku and Namine stare at each other, each blushing*

*Kairi snorts*

Riku: I suppose the entire fan base is now just wanting the two of us to kiss _right now _just for fun and giggles, right?

Magik: Probably.

Riku: Not gonna happen.

Namine: I don't know whether to feel offended or what…

*Riku leans over and whispers something in her ear. Namine blushes and looks down at her lap, grinning*

Kairi: Let me guess, not gonna happen now, is it?

Riku and Namine: Nope.

Kairi: Darn.

Namine: You didn't tell KKBeckett to submit that question, did you?

Kairi: *snorts* Please. But it's easy to see that you two should… oh never mind. Whatever. Let's just get on with this before the sexual tension reaches awkward levels.

Riku: What are you calling sexual tension?

Namine: No, Kairi, I will not slap him for you.

Kairi: *rolls eyes*

Magik: Okay, well, this is a question for everyone. *snorts* 'Do any of you have piercings or body modifications?' from KKBeckett.

Riku: Well, let's see, I have this one… and this one… and this one… Yeah. No. None.

Kairi: Same.

Namine: To be completely honest, I really haven't had the time to go _do _something like that…

Riku: Do you want to go get a tattoo? I'll go with you…

Namine: *shrugs* It's not high on my list of priorities.

Kairi: I was thinking about going and getting my ears pierced… you can always come with when I go.

Namine: *shrugs*

Magik: Last question. Also from KKBeckett: 'What's your most embarrassing moment?'

Kairi: *mutters* I was wondering if this question was going to come up…

Riku: Man, I wish I was in the same room as Sora. His embarrassing moments are always the best…

Kairi: Mostly because you remind him of all of them.

Riku: *shrugs*

Namine: *who's been thinking all this time* I don't think I have one… I mean, like… I've never done anything to be embarrassed about… I'm generally not clumsy, I think before I speak… *shrugs* I'm just going to say that I don't have one.

Kairi: Well, that's boring.

Riku: Yours is bound to be better.

Kairi: *frowns* I'm trying to think of one.

Riku: That time that Tidus knocked you down the stairs?

Kairi: *winces* That was more painful than embarrassing.

Riku: That time when you tripped and fell in the sand?

Kairi: This happens frequently. To all of us.

Riku: Erm, that time you fell off the bridge into the water?

Kairi: Why are you bringing up ALL of my klutzy moments?

Riku: *shrugs*

Kairi: Thing is, I'm not embarrassed by any of those things. They just happen. How about YOU come up with one, Riku, and then maybe I'll have one.

Riku: But I'm not embarrassed by anything. I'm ashamed of things I've done, but not embarrassed.

Namine: I think I'm just going to apologize for how boring we are and say we should move onto the next question…

Magik: Right… except that was the last question.

Riku: *getting up* Good. I have things to do.

Namine: Like what?

Riku: Not being here. Sorry to be grumpy and all, but I'm done.

Kairi: You just don't want to admit an embarrassing moment!

Riku: No, that's not it at all.

Kairi: I think you're lying!

Namine: Kairi… maybe Riku's telling the truth…

Kairi: *rolls eyes* He hasn't mentioned to you any embarrassing moments, has he?

Namine: *shakes head*

Riku: *leaves*

Namine: I'm going to go follow him. *leaves*

Kairi: I'm going to go find Sora, then.

Magik: I'm calling him in for the next one.

Kairi: *sighs* Fine then. I'll just go do something else. Maybe I'll get those lucky charms done. Or do I need to be working on those in-story?

Magik: Kind of. Sort of. It's off-stage.

Kairi: Right. Well, I'll be going then. *leaves*

xx

Magik: Welcome! I'm sure by now you know what's going on.

Xion: Our turn for questioning.

Axel: It wasn't me!

Roxas: Well, this should be fun.

Sora: I feel like I'm the odd one out.

Axel: With these two *points at Roxas and Xion* it's hard not to be.

*Roxas and Xion take seats on the couch*

*Sora sits down as well*

Axel: Where am I supposed to sit?

*lounge chair appears*

Axel: That'll do.

Xion: Let the questioning begin!

Magik: Well, first question is for Roxas, from psychicshipping: 'Why were you so hacked off at DiZ?'

Roxas: Wasn't it obvious? He was trying to control my life! And I left the Organization because _they _had been trying to control my life!

Axel: You didn't even remember that when you were trying to kill DiZ.

Roxas: I knew it. Deep down in my heart. I knew it.

Sora: Plus, you were confused. And when you're confused, you're angry. And when you're angry, you tend to just want to hurt people.

Roxas: How'd you know.

Sora: *quietly* I'm the same way.

Magik: Well, next question is for Axel. Ahem, from psychicshipping: 'You've really got it bad, don't you? For Kuin.'

Axel: *face turns as red as hair*

Roxas and Xion: That's a yes!

Axel: *growls*

Roxas and Xion laugh.

Axel: Do I need to elaborate?

Magik: Technically, that's all the question says.

Axel: *crosses hands over chest* Okay then. I'm not going to elaborate then.

Roxas: Rats.

Magik: Next question is for Sora. From Flightfoot: 'What do you think of Shad?'

Sora: Well, I've never actually met him. But I'm not too fond of him because of how mean he's been to the people I care about. I can't really say anything else though because I've never met him.

Magik: Fair enough. Next question is for Roxas again. Also from Flightfoot: 'How long have you loved Xion? And I don't mean 'when did you realize that you loved her' but when did you, honestly, start loving her?'

Roxas: *looks at Xion, thinking*

Xion: Does looking at me help?

Roxas: Yes, it does.

*moment's pause*

Roxas: From that very moment that she first took off her hood.

Xion: *blushes*

Axel: I call poodoo on that! It was SO before then!

Roxas: There's a difference between fascination and love, Axel.

Xion: There's also a difference between infatuation and love.

Axel: What are you getting at?

*Xion and Roxas smirk.*

Sora: *coughing* Kuin.

Axel: *exasperated* Not you too! *pouts*

Magik: Same question, but to Xion about Roxas.

Xion: *blinks* Wasn't expecting that.

Magik: It's not one of the questions, but I'm making it one.

Xion: *thinks* Oh, see, this isn't fair… because I didn't know what love was.

Roxas: Arguably, neither did I.

Xion: But I feel bad… because you loved me before I loved you.

Roxas: So? It's not a game.

Xion: After that first really big Heartless battle we had together. And I used the Keyblade, and then we just looked at each other and flushed… *flushes*

Roxas: That's like, the day after I realized it, so I don't count that against you.

Xion: *flushes more*

Axel: Oh boy. *looks at Sora* How do you stand this?

Sora: What? Oh, I was thinking about Kairi.

Axel: *throws hands up into air in defeat*

Magik: Next question is for Sora, so pay attention.

Sora: I'm paying attention.

Magik: From KKBeckett: 'Does your heart feel empty now that there are less people in it?'

Sora: Well, it did at first. But I think I've gotten used to it now.

Axel: Sure, HE gets a metaphysical question, while the rest of us get high-school-crush-like-questions.

Magik: *ignoring him* Next question is actually for both Sora and Roxas. Also from KKBeckett: 'Why don't you test your telepathy?'

Roxas: Assuming we have telepathy.

Sora: We wouldn't know. We've never tried.

Roxas: True.

Xion: Why don't you try now?

Sora: How?

Roxas: I think you're supposed to try and know what I'm thinking without me saying it out loud.

Sora: Well, that's easy. You're either thinking about Xion or ice cream.

Roxas: Yeah, but it's supposed to be not obvious…

Sora: Try and think of something random.

Roxas: *thinks*

Sora: Bananas?

Roxas: Where did you get THAT from?

Sora: *shrugs* I'm hungry.

Roxas: I was thinking about the beach on Destiny Islands.

Axel: How cheesy.

Roxas: Maybe if you think of something random.

Sora: *starts to think*

Roxas: Kairi. I can tell by the look on your face. Try something else.

Sora: *thinks again*

Roxas: *thinks* I have no clue.

Sora: Llamas.

Roxas: What the heck?!

Xion: *bursts out laughing*

Axel: *snorts*

Magik: Okay, moving on… Axel, from KKBeckett: 'Is Kuin a challenge to you?'

Axel: Are all my questions like this?

Magik: Pretty much.

Xion: It's your own fault.

Axel: *grumbles to self*

Magik: That's not answering the question.

Axel: I'm a bad person either way. If I say yes, I sound bad. If I say no, I sound bad. I'm not answering it.

Roxas: Appropriate response.

Magik: Next question then I suppose… Axel: from Xianit: "Do you like Kuin?"

Axel: *glares*

Sora: I think you can safely answer this question.

Roxas: If you don't, I think the rest of us can answer it for you.

Axel: *muttering* Yes.

Roxas: Yeah, thought so.

Axel: Next question.

Magik: Well, this one's for Axel again.

Axel: If it's about Kuin, I'm not answering it.

Magik: It's not.

Axel: Okay, I'll answer it.

Magik: From Cookie: 'If you could, would you bring Isa/Saix back? Or would you be happy not to because he's long gone?'

Axel: Oh… well… I asked for something deeper and not about Kuin… and I suppose I got what I asked for. My answer is no. Isa is long gone. He died sometime in the days of the Organization. I saw a sliver of him as I watched him disappear for the last time. But he was ready to go. I mean, yes, it would be really nice to have my old friend back… but at the same time, it would be weird. It would be like, dishonoring his last wish to bring him back. He wants me to remember him as he was. If I were to bring him back, it would take away from that.

*silence*

Axel: That's my final answer.

Magik: Right. Next question then… this is for anybody. From KKBeckett: 'Does anybody have any tattoos or body modifications?'

*Sora, Roxas and Xion all shake their heads*

Xion: Well, I do have a new arm…

Roxas: That doesn't count.

Axel: Well, in addition to these *points at marks on cheeks* I've got several other tattoos. I've got a Phoenix on my back, a Nobody insignia on my arm, chakrams on the other arm, 'Got it Memorized' on my chest.

Roxas: You have 'Got it Memorized' tattooed across your chest?

Axel: Are you surprised?

Roxas: No…

Xion: I feel like that was a cocky move.

Sora: I KNOW that was a cocky move.

Magik: Anything else?

Axel: I'll let them wonder.

Sora: Next question. I sense this getting awkward.

Axel: Wow, it takes a lot to make Sora awkward. I consider this an accomplishment.

Magik: The embarrassing moment question! Everyone has to answer!

Sora: Riku pushing me off the bridge into the water while I was trying to give Kairi flowers.

Roxas: That was quick.

Sora: I usually have Riku in the room reminding me of all of them, so I learned to answer this question quick.

Axel: I lit my pants on fire once…

Xion: Smooth.

Roxas: But was that your most embarrassing moment?

Axel: I'm going to say it was.

Roxas: Demyx made me sit on a Whoopee cushion once.

Axel: Demyx made almost _everyone _sit on one of those at one point.

Xion: No way he could have gotten away with that.

Axel: So long as he didn't do it to Xemnas, it didn't matter.

Xion: *pondering this* That's true…

Roxas: What's your most embarrassing moment?

Xion: *thinking* I don't know if I have one… because, I don't think losing the Keyblade really counts… or that time I cried in front of a bunch of Heartless…

Axel: Xion, those aren't really what you'd consider 'embarrassing moments'. Those are more like… secrets you want to keep about yourself.

Xion: *shrugging* Whatever.

Sora: Are there any more questions?

Magik: Nope. The bulk of them were for Axel about Kuin, actually…

Axel: *getting up* And with that, I'm leaving.

*leaves*

Sora: Should we just go ahead and go, too, then?

Magik: Yeah, might as well. I've still got two more interviews.

Xion: Who's the next set of victims?

Magik: Aqua, Terra and Ven.

Roxas: Sounds like fun.

Magik: Oh, probably.

Sora: Well, have fun.

Magik: I will.

*Sora, Roxas and Xion leave*

xx

Magik: And here we are for round three.

Aqua: Well, this should be fun.

Ven: I'm excited.

Terra: *shrugs* It'll be fun based on the questions, in my opinion.

Magik: Sit down, sit down!

*Ven proceeds to flop down on the lounge chair, leaving Aqua and Terra on the couch*

Magik: In the order in which they were received… first question is for you, Aqua: 'Does what happened with Kairi getting her Keyblade through you have a precedence? Or was it unique?' from psychicshipping.

Aqua: Erm, I'm not sure I understand what the question is asking.

Magik: I think it means is it normal in the way that Kairi received her Keyblade through you, or was it special?

Aqua: Well, there's certainly a level of specialness to it, considering Kairi is a Princess of Heart, and, generally speaking, Princesses of Heart do not wield weapons of the Keyblade's caliber. However, she inherited the Keyblade through me nonetheless. Her heart is strong. It always has been. That's all I know, really. Stuff like this hasn't happened before. So I suppose it's pretty unique.

Magik: Okay. Terra, also from psychicshipping: 'How did it feel to be Xehanort's pawn for so long?'

Terra: First question and this is what I get… Um… well… Not fun at all. Being so influenced by the darkness… it's never fun if you live past that.

Magik: Alrighty then. Ven, from psychicshipping: 'What are your feelings on Vanitas?'

Ven: Well, he was a part of me. He was all of my darkness wound up into one being. That's never a good thing—to have so much darkness in one place. I couldn't particularly like him, but at the same time, I couldn't particularly hate him—because he was a part of me. And he didn't _ask _to be the way he was.

Terra: Way to be sympathetic…

Aqua: It's in his nature.

Terra: Probably because he doesn't have any darkness left!

Ven: *shrugs*

Magik: Time for the most embarrassing moment question!

Aqua: Ugh.

Ven: Ew.

Terra: *laughs*

Ven: Mine would have to be when Terra knocked me back into a wall and I was talking about birds from hitting my head so hard.

Aqua: I'm not sure if that counts as embarrassing…

Terra: *is too busy laughing*

Aqua: Mine would be… when I failed one of my preparation exams for the Mark of Mastery. I hadn't slept much the night before and I was just so tired that I failed the preparation exam…

Ven: Way to be such a student, Aqua!

Terra: *finally stops laughing* Uh… when my pants ripped while training with Ven.

Ven: You mean when I sliced your pants with my Keyblade!

Terra: *glowers*

Aqua: *snickers*

Magik: Aaaaand, the body modification question!

Aqua: My ears are pierced…

Ven: Nothing.

Terra: *shakes head*

Magik: Moving on… Terra: From Cookie, 'A long time ago you said that Master Eraqus was also in your heart. Do you feel like he is still there now?'

Terra: *looks down sadly* The thing is, Master Eraqus's heart has been fading inside mine. The fact that he survived in there for as long as he did is a miracle. He spent most of his energy keeping my heart safe from the power and darkness of Xehanort's heart. He's almost faded now…

Aqua: Sad.

Terra: *nods*

Magik: Erm… let's get of depressing subjects… Ven: From Cookie: 'How do you feel about Roxas walking around? He looks just like you after all, that must be strange…'

Ven: *shrugs* I mean, yeah, he does look pretty much the same. But there are subtle differences.

Aqua: No offense, Roxas looks angrier. Except when he's with that Xion girl…

Terra: *snickers*

Ven: I guess he's like a brother of sorts. *shrug*

Magik: To Terra, from Exodin: 'How's that controlling the darkness going? Easier with Ven and Aqua around? Good luck!'

Terra: *smiles* It's going pretty well. Especially with my friends around *looks between Aqua and Ven, both of whom smile* Thanks!

Magik: To Terra, from Peach: 'What's it like being possessed?'

Terra: *sighs* I guess I didn't answer this one in depth enough…

Ven: You DID kind of avoid the subject…

Terra: *sighs again* Well… I don't remember most of it, because, after a while, my heart just fell asleep. I think it was good that it did, because I couldn't stand to live through what Xehanort was doing. After he stabbed himself with a Keyblade again… I don't remember anything.

Aqua: The fact that you _survived _that is a miracle.

Terra: *nods* To put it simply, not fun in the slightest.

Magik: To Ven, from Peach: 'Where's Vanitas now? Is he living in your heart dead?'

Ven: *laughs* Sorry, that's a bit of an oxymoron. Anyway, to the best of my knowledge, Vanitas is gone. Simply… destroyed. I can't feel him anymore, so I assume that's what's going on.

Magik: One for Aqua, from KKBeckett: 'Does it feel like you're a mother to Terra and Ven?'

Aqua: *laughs* Sometimes, yes.

Magik: To the three of you, from KKBeckett: 'Does it feel weird that you've been gone so long?'

Ven: Yes! So many things have changed! And I don't remember half of it because I was physically asleep! My heart was in Sora's, so I have bits and pieces of his memory… but by the time it finally got down to me in his heart, it was all muffled and stuff. So, like, coming back and seeing how different everything was… it was so weird! So many things have changed… yet, at the same time, so many things haven't…

Aqua: It feels weird in the fact that I spent as long as I did in the Realm of Darkness. Time passes so differently there. Slower. So, out here, for a while, things just seemed to be happening so fast, until I realized that this is how time is _normally _supposed to pass. It's refreshing, being back. I hope I never have to do that again!

Terra: I don't know… I sometimes feel as if I was never gone at all… and then I remember just what happened… and I don't always want to. So I don't think about it too much.

Magik: And another for all three of you, also from KKBeckett: 'Did you age any?'

Ven: Nope. Since my heart wasn't in my body, I didn't age a minute!

Aqua: Because time moves so slowly… I maybe aged a year or so. It's really too hard to tell…

Terra: I aged a year or two, before Xehanort stabbed himself with a Keyblade and prevented further aging. Then I gained another few months post-reformation. *shrugs*

Magik: Interesting enough. And, I believe that was the last question. So, you guys are free to go!

Ven: I'm hungry.

Aqua: You're always hungry.

Terra: Let's go get food.

Aqua: *rolls eyes*

*Aqua, Terra and Ven exit*

xx

Magik: Fourth and final round!

Larxene: *entering* I don't like this, why am I here?

Magik: Someone had a question for you.

*Larxene looks around, doesn't see anywhere that she wants to sit, resigns herself to leaning against the wall*

Kuin: I don't think I like this either…

Magik: Take a seat!

*Kuin sits in lounge chair, Larxene continues to stand*

Zack: Aw, she took the lounge chair!

Kuin: *smug smirk*

Zack: *sits down on couch*

Demyx: Dibs on other side of couch! *sits down on couch as well*

Luxord: It appears we are out of seats.

*armchair appears*

Luxord: I stand corrected. *sits down*

Larxene: How come a chair didn't appear for me?

Luxord: You resigned yourself to standing.

Larxene: *pouts*

Magik: First question is for Larxene, from Flightfoot: 'Who are you maddest at and why?'

Larxene: Axel. I think the 'why' part of the question is obvious.

Luxord: Perhaps you should explain it again, since the question does specify that you answer why.

Larxene: I hate you.

Luxord: No matter to me.

Larxene: *growls* *blows bangs out of face* Because he sent me to –bleeeep- Atlantica, okay? Hey! Why did they bleep me out?

Kuin: Because this fic is rated only Teen, I think.

Larxene: Shad gets away with it.

Zack: Shad doesn't get away with _that _word. He may try, but he doesn't get away with it.

Larxene: -bleeep- -bleep- -bleeeeeeeep- -bleep-

Zack: Aw, gee, thanks! I'll be sure to tell her!

Larxene: *glowers*

Magik: *recovers from laughing* Kuin! Next question is for you!

Kuin: Oh boy, here we go…

Magik: From KKBeckett: 'Does Axel following you all the time bother you? Or do you secretly like it?'

Kuin: Saw this question coming…

Demyx: Well, what's the answer?

Kuin: I've rather grown used to it, to be honest.

Demyx: So you secretly like it.

Kuin: I didn't say that. I said I'd grown used to it.

Demyx: But you…

Zack: Give it a rest. She's a girl.

Kuin: *smirks*

Magik: Kuin, from Xianit: 'Do you secretly like Axel?'

Kuin: *raises eyebrow* Are all of my questions going to be like this?

Magik: *scans through the paper* Yes.

Kuin: Ugh. No, I don't secretly like Axel. I don't know exactly what my feelings toward him are, but I don't 'like' him like you're implying. Next.

Magik: From Cookie: 'How far do your feelings go for Axel?' and he admits that he's probably going to have a gun to his head for this.

Kuin: *smirk* Smart kid. I would go as far as to say that I'm willing to protect him if we're in a bind, but I would do that out of a mutual agreement of alliance, not because I have feelings for him.

Magik: from Peach: 'Do you find Axel annoying? Or are his antics as entertaining to you as they are to us?'

Kuin: *snorts* I would certainly say his antics are entertaining and I will leave it at that.

Magik: And that's the last of the ones for Kuin about Axel.

Kuin: Do I have any for me that _aren't _about Axel?

Magik: Aside from the ones to anyone and everyone, no.

Kuin: *sighs* Of course not…

Magik: So, the body modification question!

Zack: I've got one ear piercing! *points to a single pearl in his left earlobe*

Larxene: Nothing.

Demyx: Nothing.

Luxord: *indicates the five piercings going up both ears*

Kuin: *laughs a little* *indicates single piercings on her earlobes as well as barbell piercings that go across the top of her ears* Do you want me to go through all the tattoos? I have many?

Demyx: Didn't you just go through those in-story?

Kuin: Yes.

Demyx: Then maybe you should just not go through them… unless there's any others…

Kuin: *lifts folds of her shirt ever-so-slightly to reveal a purple star on her left hip* Add that to the list I already told Axel. Let's move on.

Magik: Most embarrassing moment. Everybody.

Larxene: No comment.

Demyx: But you have to!

Larxene: No, I don't.

Demyx: What about the time we electrocuted each other?

Larxene: While that may have been embarrassing for you, I just found that funny.

Demyx: What about the time I put the farting cushion on your chair?

Larxene: I never actually sat on it. I put it on your chair, remember?

Demyx: Curses! I thought Axel did that…

Larxene: I don't have an embarrassing moment. Move on.

Demyx: I don't get embarrassed, really, actually, either… mostly because I just laugh everything off.

Luxord: I was beat at my own game of cards once…

Zack: So there was this one time, with an apple and a sword and I…

Larxene: I don't care. I'm leaving.

*leaves*

Zack: Can she do that?  
>Magik: I'd prefer that she didn't, but I'm not going to stop her.<p>

Kuin: The atmosphere in here has lightened considerably…

Zack: So can I finish my story now?

Magik: Actually, we're running short on time. I still have five questions between you, Demyx and Luxord…

Zack: *shrugs* Oh well. Lemme answer a question!

Magik: Well, from Exodin: 'How did you avoid dying, exactly?'

Zack: I don't understand the question… I've never been in a situation where I've come close to death, even…

Magik: While not entirely true, the point still stands… anyway, from KKBeckett: 'You came back for Aerith, right? Not just to fight…"

Zack: *blushes*

Kuin: That answers that question.

Magik: For Demyx! From Peach: 'What have you been up to? We haven't seen you in a while.'

Demyx: Rocking out all over the Worlds, man! *makes rockstar gesture*

Magik: On the subject of music… KKBeckett asks 'how the one man band thing is going for you?'

Demyx: Fexcellent.

Magik: And! Final question! Luxord, from KKBeckett: 'Please tell me you haven't gotten a gambling addiction.'

Luxord: *smirks* I've always had one of those.

*Demyx and Zack burst out laughing*

Magik: Welp, that's all folks! Hope you enjoyed!


	51. Hesitation

**Author's Note: **It occurred to me as I was writing the special chapter (which I wrote after the first draft of this scene) that it would have been totally cool to post this chapter for chapter 50, because the events that take place in this chapter are still significantly cool. So, without delaying any further, I'm going to let you read this chapter.

* * *

><p>"You worry too much."<p>

xx

Namine pulled her feet into her chest and looked out at the sea.

"What are you thinking about?" Riku asked, putting an arm around her.

"I've been thinking if I didn't know that he was such a horrible person, I would feel bad for Shad."

"Yeah?" Riku asked. If he was taken aback by this in any way, he didn't show it. He had been thinking about Shad quite a bit recently as well.

"Well, he sees memories," Namine said. "But only the ones entangled in darkness. I would think that a horrible existence. But he _owns_ it."

"Is there something bad about seeing memories? Or seeing only the bad ones?"

She shrugged. "Both, I suppose. Seeing memories can be confusing sometimes. So can seeing things that haven't happened yet. But I couldn't even imagine what it's like to see _only _the things shrouded in darkness. That just… doesn't make sense to me."

"I don't know what to tell you, to be honest."

"Something was different about him this time," Namine mused. "Something was off about him. He seemed a tad less in control than he did the last time I ran into him."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I'm assuming bad."

"I can only imagine it's bad for Shad," Namine said, shaking her head. "Even if it's only because he likes to be in control so much. I'm sure there are more serious repercussions."

Riku laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"You think too much," Riku replied. "Forget the Shadow for a moment. Let's talk about something else."

"Like what?" Namine asked.

"What's it like, being able to see other people's memories? If you don't mind me asking."

"I don't mind. I knew you were going to ask."

Riku raised an eyebrow.

"Not because I drew it or anything, but because I just knew the subject would come up. It was bound to."

"So, what's it like, then?"

Namine thought about this for a moment.

"Well, it's not like hearing thoughts or otherwise reading minds. I see only memories from a person—whether it be their own memory, or, in Shad's case, memories that he's chosen to remember in order to throw back at people to make them feel some negative emotion."

She looked over at Riku to ensure that he was understanding her thus far. He nodded that he was following and motioned for her to continue.

She took a deep breath. "I'll usually get an image of a memory that's connected to something that a person's thinking. Or, if they happen to be remembering something, I'll get that. Depending on how strong or clear the memory is or how closely related it is to whatever it is they're thinking, the picture I'll get will be blurry or clear. The clearer the memory in their brain, the clearer of a picture I see."

"Can you show me?"

She nodded and pulled out her sketchbook and a few pencils. She gestured at Sora with a red one. Sora and Xion were currently training over by the Paopu tree.

"Take Sora, for instance," she said as she began to draw.

The picture that spilled out onto the page was one of Sora and Kairi fighting Heartless in Castle Oblivion.

"Sora's thinking about the time when he and Kairi fought alongside each other in Castle Oblivion, despite the fact that he's training with Xion right now," Namine explained. She pointed to the picture. "I _think _that's the beginning stages of their combo, if I'm remembering it correctly."

"Can you infer someone's thoughts based on what they were thinking?" Riku asked. "Or is it really just strictly memories?"

"Theoretically, I could. But it wouldn't be a fool-proof system. People's thoughts and memories are connected, but a lot of times the memories connected to thoughts don't make sense except to the person themselves."

Riku nodded, understanding. "What about going deeper? You can see more than just what's on the surface, right?"

She nodded. "It takes time and concentration on my part, but I can do it. The only time I've had problems was with Shadow. And that's because he knew I was poking around, so that's understandable. In any normal case, I follow the links that I'm originally presented with. Take, for example, Sora's time in Castle Oblivion. You and Kairi were very prevalent in his mind. It was easy to follow those memories to memories connected to them, and then memories connected to them, and so on and so on…"

As she was talking, she had been using her hands. She flicked a pencil into the sand.

"Really?" she sighed, picking it up. She wiped it clean on her skirt.

Riku smiled. She tried to frown at him, but failed.

"Can you show me what that looks like too?" he asked. "I mean, draw a memory deeper down than what's just on top."

Namine bit her lip. "Well, I can… but I don't typically delve into anyone's memories anymore. There's no need to. Besides, I wouldn't want to end up drawing something embarrassing for someone. I mean, I suppose I could delve into Kairi, I get a lot from her anyway."

Riku looked at her questioningly.

She shook her head and flicked her hand, dismissing the unasked question. "It goes with the telekinetic thing that we have." She tapped her temple.

"Ah. Should have known. Well, you could draw something from my memories."

Namine's face flushed red. "Are you sure?"

"I have nothing to hide from you."

Her gaze met his and she realized that there were no lies in his words.

She nodded again and picked up a silver pencil.

She stared down at the blank page, but the images that filled her head weren't memories.

"Ugh, I hate it when this happens…" she muttered.

"When what happens?" Riku asked, frowning.

"When I start seeing potential futures as opposed to memories of the past."

Riku's frown remained, but it was more thoughtful this time. "What future are you seeing?"

Namine shook her head. Riku was about to ask her again when Sora and Xion ran by, kicking sand into their faces.

"Really!?" Riku shouted.

"Sorry!" Sora replied, not stopping.

"Oops…" Xion called back.

"I should just get used to having sand in my hair," Namine muttered, looking very bewildered at that particular moment. She blinked, making sure there wasn't sand in her eyes. There wasn't.

Riku laughed. "I got used to that when I was little."

"I was never little," Namine stated.

Riku's words caught in his throat. "Sometimes I forget that," he said. "Anyway, do you want me to help you comb it out?" he asked, changing the subject.

Namine shook her head. "Let's just move to the Paopu tree, okay? I don't want to sit in the sand anymore."

"Okay."

Riku helped her gather up her sketchbook and pencils and the two of them moved to the Paopu tree.

"So what was the future that you were seeing?"

"Nothing," she said, shaking her head.

"It's not 'nothing'," Riku said. "I know you better than that."

Namine blushed. She looked down at her sketchbook, still turned to an empty page, waiting for her to put the image that was so fresh in her mind down onto it. She wondered how the image could be so fresh when it _hadn't happened yet._

"It hasn't happened yet," she said, determined, both for his sake and her own. "Therefore, it's nothing."

"Even if you haven't actually drawn this yet, what have you drawn that hasn't come true at some point or another?" Riku asked.

"Not very many things," she grumbled. "But still, a lot of things I draw will only happen if certain events happen."

"You're blushing!" Riku exclaimed. "You've been blushing since I asked about this. _And _you're making excuses! _What _is this picture?"

Namine closed her eyes and began to draw.

"Don't look," she told him.

"How do you even…"

"Don't look," she insisted, still not opening her eyes.

Riku rolled his eyes and looked out onto the horizon. It was mid-afternoon. No one else was on the beach anymore now that Sora and Xion had left to… wherever they had gone off to. Kairi and Roxas were still out at Olympus Coliseum it would seem. No one ever knew where Axel was half the time…

"There," Namine said. She opened her eyes just as Riku looked down at the picture. He raised his eyebrows.

"_This _is what you didn't want me to see?"

Namine didn't respond.

Riku brought the sketchbook to his own lap so he could get a better look—even though he knew _exactly _what the picture portrayed. "So let me get this straight, you didn't want me to see this picture because it hasn't happened yet?"

"Well… you haven't… I didn't… we haven't…"

The words kept catching in her mouth, not wanting to come out. She wasn't entirely sure of what she wanted to say.

"You're embarrassed?" Riku asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I…it's just…but you… and it…" After stumbling around for a few more words, her voice became clearer. "No."

"Do you know _when _this is supposed to happen?" Riku inquired, a mischievous look in his eye.

She shook her head.

"This was just the image presented to me. It was surprisingly clear…" she frowned, still trying to figure that out.  
>Riku didn't care about that detail. "You saw an image of us <em>kissing<em>, and you don't know when it's going to take place?" Though the words were slightly accusatory, he was mostly just teasing.

"It's not an exact science," Namine replied, shrugging her shoulders. Her cheeks flushed red once again. "We haven't quite figured out _exactly _why I can do this…"

Riku cut her off, not really caring about how it was that she could see the future.

"Would you be opposed if…?" he began, setting the sketchbook down.

Her eyes grew wide.

"Would you?" he asked again, not needed to specify the 'what' of the sentence.

She shook her head.

He leaned over and cupped her face gently in his hand. She smiled, he smiled. He laughed nervously.

Deciding that he was taking too long, Namine straightened up so her lips met his faster. His eyes registered shock before simply smiling. Her eyes laughed, then she closed them.

The moment was interrupted when Riku lost his balance and fell off the Paopu tree, taking Namine with him.

"Ouch!"

"Oof!"

"Who am I, Sora?" Riku asked, staring up at the sky. "I've never been so clumsy…"

"Well, on the bright side," Namine laughed, speaking into Riku's chest. "You broke my fall."

"I meant to do that."

"Fall? Or break _my_ fall once you realized we were falling?"

"The second one," Riku said, sitting up.

Namine sat up as well and smoothed out her skirt.

"That is not how I imagined that to be," he said quietly.

"Well, I'm pretty sure you didn't plan on falling off the Paopu tree," Namine replied, laughing.

"Definitely not. But like, I wanted to wait until the perfect moment, and when I saw that picture, I thought that maybe this was it… and then I messed it up by knocking is both to the ground."

"I don't think you messed it up," Namine said. "I mean, it was nice…"

Riku raised an eyebrow.

Namine started laughing. "The kissing part was great! The falling… well, I could have done without that bit, to be honest."

Riku laughed too. He leaned over and kissed her again. This kiss lasted longer, mostly because they didn't have anywhere to fall. Well, if they had tried, they could have fallen off the little island into the ocean, but there were several bushes in their way.

"So," Riku said, after a bit. "Do you want to draw some of my memories now?"

Namine laughed. "If I _could_, I'm not sure if my brain's working right at the moment."

"I couldn't imagine why!"

They both laughed. She grabbed her sketchbook anyway and looked down at it.

"I can give it a shot."

Riku grinned.

"You're thinking that on purpose," she said, staring at the blank page.

"It's kind of hard not to."

She stuck her tongue out at him.

"I thought you couldn't read thoughts," he teased.

"Well, at the particular moment, your thoughts are rather obvious."

Riku laughed again. She smiled.

"Try?"

She nodded and closed her eyes, following the chain of memories down. Kissing, some more kissing, several thoughts of kissing that didn't actually happen that Namine could only assume were Riku's old thoughts of how he wanted their first kiss to be, falling off the Paopu tree, Sora falling off the Paopu tree, Kairi laughing at Sora… Racing Sora on the beach… walking alongside Sora to fight Xemnas… seeing a transparent Namine standing next to Kairi in The World That Never Was… Namine standing next to Roxas… fighting Roxas… fighting Sora… fighting Zexion disguised as Sora… seeing Kairi but hearing Namine talk him out of the darkness… Maleficent…

Namine stopped, backing up. Not something she wanted to draw.

Seeing Kairi and hearing Namine… sitting on the Clocktower as Namine burst out with saying that she could see both Sora and Roxas simultaneously… a slew of images of seeing Namine rather than Kairi…

Namine began to draw. The picture that came out on the page was a semi-transparent-looking Namine sitting on a chair in Hollow Bastion, looking cold and forlorn. Riku stood across from her, holding out a hand as if to offer her comfort in some way.

She showed the picture to Riku. He cocked his head to one side. "That's not how it happened. Not exactly."

"But that's how it _felt _to you. Memories display not what _was _but how it _felt_. You _wanted _to reach out and comfort me, but you never did for whatever reason."

"Well, I couldn't have touched you if I had," he argued. "You were completely… you weren't tangible!"

"Not the point, Riku," she chided. "Stop freaking out about how it's not exactly how it happened and think about the fact that I just dove into your memories and this is what I found."

"What is that look on your face for?"

"You love me more than I think either of us can even say."

He reached over and put a hand on her cheek.

"Can you say the same about yourself?"

Her response was to move very rapidly into his awaiting arms and hold him tight.

"You wanted to comfort me."

"Yes."

"Even then, did you like me?"

"You don't already know the answer to that?"

"Your mind was such a tangled mess that I never bothered. It's too much energy."

Riku thought about both what she had said and the answer to her question for a moment.

"I suppose you could say I did," he said. "I don't know, it's hard to say. I felt _something _towards you. I'm not sure if I had pinned exactly what it was yet. Does it matter?"

She shook her head. "I was just curious."

"Did you know, then?"

She shrugged. "It's hard to say," she said, mimicking his words. "But mostly because I was too busy worrying about everyone I had to save. I didn't start really thinking about you like that until Castle Oblivion."

He grinned a little. "You worry too much."

"So do you."

"Touche."

The two of them sat there in each other's arms, quietly, for a while, just watching the waves lap on the beach.


	52. Yours Alone

**Author's Note: **So, here's the second half of the Namiku sequence. Except, it's not really half, it's not as long as the chapter before it. But this is where the chapter split fell. For my new reader(s), check out the answers to your questions on my blog. (Link's on my profile, since I can't post it here.) Um, I think that's all the business, so, enjoy!

* * *

><p>"I wasn't going to mention that part."<p>

xx

"I don't just see memories and things that haven't happened yet but have the potential too," Namine said after a while. "I also see memories that haven't actually happened."

"Hmm?" Riku said.

"Memories that haven't really happened but your heart has accepted to be real because you have thought about them enough to make them seem so."

"Where did that come from?"

"I saw memories of us kissing that I know haven't happened."

Riku flushed.

Namine laughed at him.

"I was thinking about it for a while, okay?" he said, defensively.

"I noticed."

He frowned. "We should probably get up off the ground," he said, changing the subject.

"I'm afraid that if we sit on the Paopu tree we'll fall off again," Namine said.

"You sit on the Paopu tree. I'll just stand, okay?"

"That's mean, to make you do that."

"Well, let's try sitting and not falling."

"If we fall…" she began.

"We won't fall," he interrupted.

"I'll blame you," she finished.

Riku rolled his eyes.

They gathered themselves up and moved back to the Paopu tree. It didn't take long for Namine to pull out her sketchbook once more and absentmindedly being sketching once again. Riku said nothing on the matter, having grown used to her doing this.

"So, if _you_ don't mind _me_ asking," she said as she drew. "What did you do during that year, or rather, year and a half, when you weren't answering to DiZ?"

"Where did that come from?" Riku asked, genuinely surprised at her question.

"I saw something in your memories that got me thinking about it," she replied simply. "However, I didn't go down that train because I didn't really want to. I want you to tell me about it rather than seeing it for my own."

Riku shrugged. "Fair enough. Um… wow, what _else _did you see in my memories?"

"I don't know, whatever was in between what was at the surface and the eventual memory of that night in Hollow Bastion. You gave me permission to look."

"True," Riku said. "It's just interesting. You saw a lot."

She shrugged. "It wasn't always that way. Like I said earlier, you were a tangled mess. In fact, you probably still are, I'm just better at looking through things because I know you better. And I have more energy to devote to delving farther."

"Good? I guess."

She shrugged, not saying one way or another.

"So what _did _you do during that time?" she asked.

"Well, I looked after Roxas, I made sure Sora didn't hurt himself." He began listing things off, counting on his fingers as he went. "I tried to keep Kairi safe—which would have worked fine if Axel hadn't tracked her to Twilight Town, and by the time I figured that out, Saix had her. I still feel bad about that. But when I finally figured out where she was…"

"I'd gotten to her," Namine said with a small laugh.

Riku nodded. "It's fine though. I had necessary delays…"

"Like?"

"My Dive."

"Oh."

"What did you do?" Riku asked, changing the subject. "After I left you and Axel alone, you obviously didn't stay together."

"He and I split up pretty quickly, actually. Now I realize that it was because he knew I wouldn't approve of him trying to get Roxas back by turning Sora into a Heartless. I think that's what first got me thinking about trying to bring Roxas back—aside from the nagging memories of Xion that I had. But anyway, I moved around, never staying in one place for too long lest I be noticed. I knew something had happened to Kairi, and I would have gotten to her sooner if I hadn't been avoiding Twilight Town."

"Staying away from DiZ?" Riku asked.

She nodded. "I don't think he would actually kill me if he saw me, but I know he wouldn't be too happy with you if he knew that you let me live."

She stopped drawing for a second and looked at the picture in front of her. It was one of Roxas and Kairi taking out some Defenders and Invisibles in Olympus Coliseum. She had nearly completed it, too.

"They went there this morning!" Riku exclaimed. "That's so weird!"

Namine shrugged. "I've gotten used to simple things like this."

Riku decided that he'd have to get used to them too.

"Why did you let me go, anyway?" Namine asked, returning to the previous topic of conversation. "I mean, you told us it was repayment for Castle Oblivion, but I get the sense there was more to it than that."

"Well, there are multiple reasons," Riku said with a shrug. "First of all, it was repayment for Castle Oblivion. You both saved my life. Second of all, eliminating you would be taking too many steps backwards into the darkness. I was already dealing with enough of it as it was, I didn't want to add to the problem. Thirdly, well…"

He paused, trying to phrase it right.

"Even then, the thought of killing you was repulsive to me. I thought it was because you were a part of Kairi and I didn't want to do that to her. But now, now I have to wonder if there was something more."

Namine smiled.

"When did you have your Dive?" she asked. "Sometime while you were keeping an eye on Kairi, I take it?"

"It was several weeks after that afternoon on Sunset Hill, actually. I'd been focusing on going about fighting Heartless, taming the darkness, keeping an eye on Sora while simultaneously making sure Kairi didn't become a target of the Organization. One night, while I was asleep, I dreamt about it. The next day when I summoned my blade to fight off an Orcus in Twilight Town, I had a Keyblade."  
>Namine nodded, still listening intently. She had even halted her drawing process during his storytelling.<p>

"That's about it," Riku told her. "There's not really much else."

"Oh, well, interesting. Same with the part where you were doing _so many things _at once."

She frowned.

"What is it?" Riku asked.

"Kairi's in…" she paused. "Nope, never mind. She _was _in trouble, but someone seems to have fixed that problem. Probably Roxas, he's rather protective of her for Sora's sake…"

"How can you tell that she was in trouble?"

"I'm connected to her still. I can feel when she's in trouble. I can also feel extreme emotions. I can even read her thoughts if they're strong enough and we're close enough. I've learned to block most of it, just for privacy's sake"

She rambled this off as if it were the most normal thing in the world. Riku wasn't surprised.

"Does it work in reverse?" he asked.

"Well, I know she can read some of my thoughts," Namine replied, thinking. "And I think she can probably feel my stronger emotions as well. She's never really mentioned. She's probably blocking stuff as well. We haven't talked about it much…"

"So, would she feel it if I did this?" he asked, interrupting her by kissing her on the lips.

"Mmm," Namine murmured. "She probably can."

"Do you care?" Riku asked, a smile dancing in his eyes.

"Absolutely not!"

Riku laughed.

They kissed once more.

"You've got that face," Riku said after a moment.

"What face?" Namine asked.

"The 'I need to draw something' face."

Namine made a different face, because she knew Riku was right. She pulled out her sketchbook and a red pencil.

The picture that spilled onto the page involved two Kairis. As well as Roxas and Tifa.

"Parallel universe again?" Riku asked.

"I can only assume so," Namine replied.

"The other Kairi looks younger," Riku mused.

"And like she's been thrown into an adventure she doesn't want to take," Namine added

"I wasn't going to mention that part," Riku said. "I feel like most of us went on our adventures regardless of whether or not we wanted to."

"This is very true," Namine said.

"I'm glad my adventures led to you," Riku said softly.

Namine felt a smile tug on the corners of her mouth.

"And I'm glad mine led to you!"


	53. 13th Anthology

**Author's Note: **AAAAND! Another chapter! This one was almost late... but I'm getting it to you! Erm... don't have too much to say about it, other than this scene took a completely different turn than what I had originally planned. But that's a story for the blog. So, enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Have you ever tried lying to Aerith?"<p>

xx

"Master Ienzo! We've got Heartless outside!"

Pi shouted these words up the staircase, in the hopes that Ienzo would actually hear him. Ienzo did actually hear him most of the time, he just chose not to respond just about all of the time.

"Can't you take care of them?" Ienzo replied. He felt no need to shout, he just allowed his voice to carry down the stairs.

"I was built for research and recon, not fighting!"

"You can summon a shield, can you not?"

"Yes! But…"

Ienzo was silent.

"Why can't _you _come help?" Pi said, sounding rather desperate.

"I'm in the middle of my own research!"

"If the Heartless get into the shop, you're not going to have any research to conduct!"

Ienzo sighed very audibly. He closed the book he was currently browsing through, but not before marking his page with a strip of cloth. He was above bending the corners of pages. It ruined the binding if the books were closed on earmarked pages.

He made his way down the stairs smoothly and quietly. Pi was waiting at the bottom, looking frantically between the Heartless outside and Ienzo.

"If you'd just agree to board up the windows like every other shopkeeper on this street…" Pi began.

"That deters business," Ienzo replied.

"What if you boarded them up, but created the illusion that they weren't?"

"Tempting, I may look into that."

Though, he didn't sound like he actually would look into that.

Ienzo stepped out of the front door and summoned the appropriate lexicon. The Heartless outside were unnamed. They were new and he hadn't bothered to come up with a name for them. Nor had anyone else as far as he could tell. What he did know about them was that they were pureblood and their only attack (except for physical slashes) was to form a pool of darkness under their victim in an attempt to suck them into the darkness.

The pools were small and ineffective unless several of the Heartless were creating the same pool of darkness. They were also easily avoided if one remained off the ground.

To start off, Ienzo muttered a levitating spell. Then he set to work creating pools of darkness to suck the Heartless back in. He was pretty certain it didn't destroy the Heartless completely, just sucked them back to the Realm of Darkness, but at the particular moment, he couldn't be bothered to take them to another dimension and destroy them there, and there was no purpose of absorbing any more of them into his lexicon. He liked these Heartless to come in a variety of other Heartless, so he had more attacks to mirror and reciprocate back on them.

Especially since it was becoming increasingly obvious that his methods of getting rid of the Heartless weren't doing any good.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Pi. Naturally, Pi appeared to be cowering slightly. He never did do well with enemies around.

Ienzo had an idea.

"Pi," he barked. "Summon your shield, please. And try not to stay in one place for too long. I don't want to have to send a rescue mission to the Realm of Darkness."

Had Pi been in a better state of mind, he probably would have combatted Ienzo's statement by saying that since he was a Replica, it wouldn't matter too much if he was sent to the Realm of Darkness. However, instead he just looked at Ienzo like he was crazy.

"I'm not built to fight!" he spluttered.

"I know that," Ienzo said. "But can you do me a favor and bash a couple of those Heartless for me? Just enough so that I can mimic the attack and use it against the Heartless myself."

"Don't you know any melee attacks?"

"You're stalling," Ienzo pointed out.

Pi grumbled and summoned his shield.

"To answer your question," Ienzo said. "I know a few, but none of them are in this lexicon, and I'm not about to start bashing it on their heads."

Pi started attacking. Ienzo paid close attention, memorizing the moves, feeding them into his lexicon.

Pi wasn't accustomed to fighting in the slightest. He wasn't programmed to fight. He spent more time accidentally killing Heartless than intentionally killing them.

"Hmm, melee attacks are quite effective on them," Ienzo thought aloud. "Good to know."

Pi yelped. His foot had slid into a pool of darkness. Without hesitation, Ienzo repeated the levitation spell and threw it at Pi.

"Thank you," Pi spluttered.

"Stay put for the moment," Ienzo told him. "But you don't have to keep fighting if you don't want to."

Pi nodded. However, he kept his shield out.

Ienzo began to mimic the attacks that he had watched Pi perform. Melee attacks were very effective. He'd have to bring out a different lexicon next time around. He had one that had both Riku's and Axel's attacks in it. (He'd gone _searching _through The World That Never Was to find it… only to locate it in Castle Oblivion instead. He'd then had to argue with a couple of older Vexen Replicas to get it back.)

Shaking his head to clear himself from that thought, he went back to focusing on the Heartless. With his new attacks, they didn't last all that long. Once the last of them had been disposed of, Ienzo spoke the release of the levitating spells. Ienzo himself dropped rather gracefully, knowing the let go was coming. Pi stumbled a bit, but for his ego's sake, at least, he didn't fall.

Ienzo snapped his lexicon shut. "Time to go back inside."

He strut back inside and back up to his office.

"What about the illusions for the windows?" Pi called back up after him.

"Another time," was the response.

Pi sighed.

xx

Ienzo was in the middle of compiling a single lexicon for the current Heartless fighting situation. He wanted one with a good balance of melee attacks and various spells. Of course, these lexicons always tended to be heavier than one that contained one or the other. But he was kidding himself to think that he could get by with magic and illusions alone. (Illusions were standard in all of his lexicons, so he didn't generally include them in his lists.)

"Ienzo!" Pi called up the stairs.

Ienzo sighed and pushed his glasses back up his nose.

"Yes?" he called back.

"We have a visitor."

Ienzo noted that Pi did not say 'customer.' He frowned. He hadn't heard the bell to the door jingle, so he wasn't aware they had company in the slightest. He'd have to check into that.

"Give me thirty seconds," Ienzo said.

He pocketed his glasses and straightened up his shirt. He bookmarked all three lexicons that he was currently working on and then made his way down the stairs.

"That was thirty-four seconds," Pi said.

Ienzo resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

Their visitor was a woman. Ienzo had seen her around. She was with Leon and Aerith. Her most striking feature being her giant angel wings, it was impossible to miss her.

"Hello Rinoa," Ienzo said.

"Hello," she replied with a smile.

"Is there something I can help you with?" Ienzo asked.

"I have a question to ask you."

Ienzo motioned for her to go ahead.

"Did you happen to receive one of these recently?" she asked, pulling a letter out of her pocket. The letter was plain, save for one very distinguishing feature: the tell-tale Mouse Ear Seal.

Ienzo's nose twitched. "What of it?"

"Is there any particular reason why you didn't show up to the meeting a few days ago?"

"Is there any particular reason why you care?"

"Well, I happened to notice your magical ability, and so I wondered if you'd received an invitation. I suppose it's not my business why you didn't attend."

"There's no magical way to fix the Worlds we live in," Ienzo quipped. "The King is noble for trying, but the idea is bound to fail."

"So you're not going to search for a solution, then?" Rinoa asked.

"It's not my business."

"Anyone who knows of the danger should make it their business."

Her voice was calm, despite the argument plain in her words.

"I've had enough dealings with the balance and imbalance of these Worlds," Ienzo replied. "I would quite like to just stay here and not bother with anything outside of my doorstep."

"The Heartless in Hollow Bastion are getting worse, you have to admit to that."

"I haven't seen any ones except the ones that have been appearing in the streets lately."

"The Poolers?" Rinoa asked, cocking her head to one side.

"Perhaps. They're the ones that form the pool of… Poolers. That would make sense."

"Yuffie named them," Rinoa said with a shrug.

"Regardless, I haven't seen any Heartless besides those."

"They are coming more frequently," Pi interjected.

Ienzo rubbed his temples. "What are you getting at, Rinoa?"

"I'm asking you to look just a tad past your doorstep and help us find a solution to Hollow Bastion's problem at the very least."

Ienzo frowned. "I'll see what I can find."

"Really?" Rinoa asked, incredulous. "I expected more of an argument!"

"He may just be saying that to get rid of you," Pi said. "He does that with me frequently."

Ienzo frowned.

"Will you see that he actually looks into it?" Rinoa asked.

Pi threw up his hands. "I can't guarantee you how much good I'll be. He hardly ever listens. He's like a mad scientist!"

"No more than Vexen was," Ienzo muttered.

"Would you please look into it though?" Rinoa asked. "Hollow Bastion needs all the help it can get. And I'm not just asking for my personal benefit, this will help you too."

"I suppose it's a better use of my energy than illusions over the windows," Ienzo said.

Pi frowned.

"Thank you," Rinoa said with a nod.

"I didn't technically agree…"

Rinoa was already out the door.

"Are you actually going to look into Hollow Bastion's balance problems?" Pi asked.

"I'm strongly considering it. But mostly so that I can live a peaceful life."

"You're so selfish," Pi exclaimed!  
>Ienzo didn't respond.<p>

xx

"Hello there," Axel said, startling Rinoa as she walked out of the door of Ienzo's shop.

She jumped just a tad. "You startled me!" she exclaimed. "What are you doing there?"

"Faulty star shard," Axel said, playing with said faulty star shard. "I came here in the hopes that Cid might know what's wrong with it. Of course, since it's faulty, I'm not too surprised as to why it dropped me off outside of Ienzo's shop than Aerith's house. I was just about to walk over there when I heard the wonderful argument going on between you two."

Rinoa's eyes flashed white for a second, showing her irritation. "How much did you hear?"

"Oh, practically the whole thing. It was amusing to say the least."

Axel started walking. Rinoa followed.

"You forgot to ask him a very important question, however," Axel said, once they were well away from the shop.

"And that would be?"

"He was one of Xehanort's closest men. Wouldn't you think he would know how to reverse some of the damage Xehanort's done?"

"Do you honestly think he would?" Rinoa asked. "I mean, you know him better than I do…"

Axel rolled his eyes. "Believe me, you can pretty much not count all that time spent in the Organization. None of us had emotions, making it ridiculously easy to lie and hide things from one another. The first six in the Organization were a completely different story than the rest of us. He was number six."

"Do you suggest I ask?" Rinoa asked.

"No, not now, it'll only look suspicious. Plus, he knows I was out there. If you go back now, he'd know I put you up to this. He's smart, he'd figure it out. Ask another time. Better yet, have _Aerith _go ask."

"Why Aerith?"

Axel raised an eyebrow. "Have you ever tried lying to Aerith?"


	54. What Lies Beneath

**Author's Note: **So, this chapter's a tad different. Rather than one specific plot for this chapter, I've got three going. They're all split into segments and whatnot. But you get to see a variety of characters! I'll explain more about why this chapter is this way on the blog. (Saving you from reading long author's notes.) Anywho, enjoy!

* * *

><p>"That is such a guy thing to do..."<p>

xx

"See, I do stuff!" Axel said, throwing his chakram at some unidentified pureblood Heartless.

"You decided it would be fun to tag along while I worked," Kuin replied, shooting several more unidentified Heartless. She had two guns out and was aiming them opposite directions.

"We're in Twilight Town!" Axel said. "Of course I have to help out!"

Kuin rolled her eyes.

"You were only here for recreation," she said. "You don't even have that cloak of yours on."

Axel shrugged. "So?"

"Just observing, that's all."

"Aw flaming fu…" Axel said.

Kuin frowned, her head instantly snapping over to where Axel was.

"What's wrong?"

"Bandages are slipping," he grunted. "Aerith didn't put them on tight enough yesterday when I was over there… granted, I think she mentioned I probably shouldn't be fighting…"

Kuin put both of her guns together and set off a blast larger than she could usually set off with one singly.

"Do we need to move?" she asked.

"I should be good to…"

Kuin set off another blast and did a flip over to where Axel was. "I don't believe you," she said. "Activate that star shard for someplace without Heartless."

"I'm serious, I'll be fine!"  
>"Don't make me reach into your pocket!"<p>

With a groan of annoyance, Axel activated the star shard, leading both him and Kuin to, of all places, the Grey Area.

"Why are we _here_?" Kuin asked.

"You said someplace without Heartless!" Axel retorted.

Kuin grunted. "Well, all right then. Off with your shirt, let's fix this bandage debacle."

"Excuse me?"

"They're falling off, they need to be fixed."

"And since when can you heal?"

"I didn't say I was a Healer, I just implied that I could fix your bandages. If you want to do it yourself, fine, go ahead. But I think I'm the only one out of the two of us that has fresh bandages."

"That is such a girl thing…" Axel muttered.

"Shirt, off."

Axel begrudgingly took his shirt off.

"Sheesh, what did you _do_?" Kuin exclaimed upon seeing the damage. Axel's wound had mostly healed up, but there was still a nasty soon-to-be-scar that oozed just a tad.

"Claymore to the gut," Axel said softly.

"You _have _to explain that one now," she said. "You can't leave me in the dark now."

"Just re-bandage," Axel said. "I'll explain while you do then, I guess. And do a better job than Aerith."

xx

"I had heard that you were still here," Mickey said.

Ansem turned around, surprised at the voice that he heard.

"How is it that you are here?" he asked. "There is no normal entrance to this Realm."

"I had a friend create a Corridor," Mickey said, walking up to the rock that Ansem was sitting on. He wore an old cloak of his, that masked everything except two distinct ears.

"Isn't that detrimental to their heart?" Ansem asked.

"She's a Replica," Mickey replied. "It's built into her Data."

Ansem made an understanding grunt. Mickey decided not to press the matter much further, given Ansem's past history of interactions with Replicas.

"What brings you here?" Ansem asked.

"I came to speak with you," Mickey said. "To ask you why you are still here. You could have easily left when Sora and Riku came through here."

"I chose not to leave. I have done my fair share of damage in the Realm of Light."

"Things are different now, you could easily come back."

"Are things really all that different?"

"Xehanort is gone."

Ansem raised his eyebrows. "Sora, I presume?"

"All of us," Mickey replied.

"And what of all the other lives I marred?"

"We saved them," Mickey said. "Well, most of them."

He looked down at his feet and frowned.

"Who was lost?"  
>"Aeleus; Isa."<p>

Ansem bowed his head for his former fallen apprentices.

"I called together as many magical people as I could in an attempt to figure out how to combat the growing darkness."

"It will never work."

"You weren't always this pessimistic."

"You were always the optimist."

"I still am."

"How did the meeting go?"

Mickey sighed. "Unfortunately, we can't seem to come up with a way to get our magics to work together against the darkness."

Ansem gave a smug snort.

"We will figure it out," Mickey said, determined. "I have faith in all of my friends."

Ansem said nothing.

"We might be able to learn more if you came back."

"Not today. It is not time for me to return yet."

"When will it be time for you to return?"

"I will know when it is time," Ansem replied.

Mickey sighed. He sensed that this conversation was over. In swift movements, he stood up, turned an about face and squeezed a small charm. A corridor opened in front of him and he walked through it.

"I will have to thank Kairi for letting me borrow this," he mused, fingering the charm.

xx

"Why are you smirking?" Riku asked.

"Because you and Namine finally kissed," Kairi responded.

"How did you know?"

Kairi raised an eyebrow.

"I should have known. But really, why is that cause for smirking?"

"I won the bet that Sora and I made about when it would happen."

Riku frowned. "I feel that you have an unfair advantage with that."

Kairi shrugged. "He was the one who insisted we make it."

Riku buried his forehead in his hand. "He would."

Both of them paused, looking around the hedge maze they were in.

"Heartless," they whispered.

In the time it took them to summon their Keyblades, a large mass of Novashadows surrounded them.

"Well, isn't this just beautiful," Kairi muttered.

"You've learned Holy, right?" Riku asked.

"Yeah."

"Let me teach you a combo then."

Kairi looked warily about the Novashadows still surrounding them.

"How long is this going to take?"

Riku grabbed her arm. "Not long at all. Let the Light take over and shoot out bursts of Pearl at them."

"Okay."

Riku spun them about. Kairi followed his lead and they both shot bursts of Pearl out of the tips of their Keyblades at the Novashadows. The Novashadows almost seemed to grimace at all the Light. In no time, Kairi and Riku were alone once again in the hedge maze.

"That was fun!" Kairi exclaimed, pushing her hair out of her face. "What was it called?"

"Holy Burst," Riku replied. "The King taught it to me."

"The King!" Kairi exclaimed. "Wow. I feel like I probably didn't do it _nearly _as good as him…"

"Don't worry about it," Riku said with a bit of a laugh. "You'll learn and get better."

"Do you think he invented the combo?"

"Quite possibly. There's another one that goes with it. Inverse Burst."

"How would I do that?"

"You just do the same thing. I'm the one who uses the darkness."

Kairi cocked her head to one side. "Is that good for you?"

Riku shrugged. "I don't think it's bad. I've got my darkness in check. I'm not too worried about it."

"Huh," Kairi said. "Well then we'll have to test it out sometime. Just so I can see what it does."

"It's not as effective against the pure bloods as the Light is."

Kairi shrugged. "Another day then."

Riku's nose flared.

"Heartless!"  
>"I feel them too," Kairi said, summoning her Keyblade. "Let's do this!"<p>

xx

"So, let me get this straight," Kuin said, leaning back against one of the couches in the Grey Area. "Saix went crazy, but in the end, you still tried to save him?"

Axel shrugged, easing back into his shirt. "He was my best friend once, I had to."

Kuin frowned. "Did Xehanort die that day?" She didn't look at him as she asked this question, she just stared off into the windows that showed more Nothingness.

Axel frowned too, gazing off into the distance like she was doing. "Yes, he did. What does that have to do with Saix?"

"It doesn't. Xehanort and I have a history, that's all." She sighed.

"I know that," Axel said. "Well, I know some of it, anyway."

"I just…" Kuin began. "I just want to be sure he's dead."

There was something different in her tone, something that Axel wasn't used to really hearing. She sounded, slightly desperate, actually. Desperate in the way that she really needed to know that Xehanort was, in fact, dead.

"Trust me, he's gone," Axel said, looking right at her.

"How can you be sure?"

"He had several Keyblades full of light blasted through him. Xehanort's _gone_. It left Terra behind, that's it."

"Terra?"

"Yeah, some poor kid that Xehanort possessed like… ten or so years ago."

"Mm, him," Kuin said.

"Yeah," Axel said. "Pretty sure Xehanort's not coming back after all that."

"Just pretty sure?" Kuin asked. It sounded like she had been trying to make a tad bit of a joke, but it didn't work all that well.

Axel laughed. "Do you want me to vow to protect you if he does come back?"

Kuin frowned. "No! I can take care of myself. If he does come back though, I'll have to kill him myself. Make sure it's done right."

Axel laughed. "Whatever you want."

"Were you seriously going to vow that?" Kuin asked.

Axel shrugged. "If it was going to make you happy."

Kuin frowned once again. "That would imply that you were my protector in some sort of relationship. That's… no."

Axel rolled his eyes. Kuin chose not to say something.

They were quiet for a few moments.

"So can we just talk about how you have 'Got it Memorized' tattooed across your chest?" Kuin said, her voice lifting up a little at the end as she started to smile.

Axel burst out laughing.

"Why?" Kuin asked.

"Why not!"

"Why would you get something like that tattooed across your chest?"

"Why not?!"

Kuin rolled her eyes. "That is such a guy thing to do…"

"Oh come on, don't you have some random tattoo like that?"

Kuin shook her head. "Absolutely not."

"Oh, whatever."


	55. Friends Forever

**Author's Note: **Yay updates! Heheh... this chapter makes me laugh. Especially Xion. Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Shh, I like using magic."<p>

xx

Axel appeared in the small sandy patch set aside for people using a star shard to get in. He was surprised to find six people staring at him.

"Yo," he said, giving a small salute.

"So, tell us about Kuin," Xion said, crossing her arms over her chest.

Axel scratched the back of his neck.

"Uh, what about her? And hey, shouldn't I move?"

"Why?" Roxas asked. "Most everyone who usually comes in is already here."

Axel grumbled. "Why do you need to know about Kuin?"

"Because you're spending every one of your waking moments with her," Xion said. "You're our friend, we _deserve _to know."

In a past life, Axel would have cursed the day he taught Xion about friendship. But Axel was past that. Way past that.

"I get the feeling that you two are _really _the only two who care about this, so why is _everyone _here?"

"I care," Namine said quietly. "Mostly because I'd like to know more about this girl that I keep drawing with you. She seems pretty cool, but my drawings never tell personality traits."

"I _could _say that I'm here because Namine's here," Riku said. "But I would like to know if she can be trusted."

Axel snorted.

"I'm here because I think she can be trusted," Sora said with a shrug.

"I would actually just like to meet her," Kairi said.

Axel sighed. "Well, if I'm going to tell you all about her, we might as well move into someplace more comfortable."

"The sand is comfortable," Riku said.

"Oi," Axel replied.

The seven of them moved away from the star-shard arrival area and began to settle themselves in the sand.

"Shall we make a bonfire?" Xion asked, getting a rather excited smile on her face.

"Why? It's not cold…" Sora mused.

"Oh, well, a bonfire just seemed to be a good idea," Xion said.

"It's the middle of summer right now, Xion," Kairi said. "Now's not really the best time for a bonfire."

Xion sighed. "All right."

"Maybe when it gets dark?" Roxas suggested.

"This won't take that long!" Axel exclaimed, looking at the late afternoon sky.

"Fine, whatever," Roxas said. "But maybe me and Xion still want to do a bonfire!"

"Weirdos," Axel said.

"So, Kuin," Kairi said, pulling part of what would soon be a Wayfinder out of her basket. She started to work on it.

"What about her?"

"Why didn't you tell us when you first met her, for starters?" Xion asked.

"Who's to say I didn't?" Axel asked.

"It's obvious that you did," Roxas said. "That and…"

"Sorry," Namine interjected.

"What?" Axel asked.

"It's not in my sketchbook," Namine said, thumping the book with her thumb. "Just on a random scrap of paper, but I drew what I assumed to be your first meeting of her—since Ven was in the picture."

Axel sighed.

"Why is this so important?"

"We're your friends," Roxas said.

"All of us," Sora interjected.

"Friends tell friends everything," Xion added.

"Alright," Axel said. "So when I ran into Kuin at first, I hardly believed she was real, to be honest. Which is why I didn't want to tell any of you about her, because I thought if I did, you'd all think I was crazy."

"We've seen some pretty weird stuff," Sora began.

"Yeah, and I have too," Axel said. "And I _still _didn't believe she was real. Until I found her again…"

"You could have told us then," Xion said.

Axel shrugged. "It all happened so fast," he said. "And she's not sure what to think of Keyblade Wielders."

Riku coughed.

"Should I be offended?" Sora asked.

"It's essentially her job to keep balance in the universe," Axel said. "And she had a hard time when there weren't any Keyblade Wielders around."

The other six exchanged blank glances.

"I take this to mean _before _any of us actually Wielded," Sora said. "Since, ever since I got a blade, _someone _has had a blade between the six of us."

"You don't need to count me," Namine said, looking up from whatever drawing she was working on.

Sora shrugged, dismissing her comment. "Therefore, we're not really to blame."

"Oh," Riku mused.

"What I'm drawing or what they're saying?" Namine asked.

"Both," Riku said.

Namine took note of the picture that she had been absentmindedly drawing. It was a picture of Xehanort, staring very evilly at the viewer of the picture, Keyblade in hand, sparkling with Dark Thundaga.

"Yech!" she exclaimed, tearing it out of her book.

"I thought you kept every picture," Riku said quietly.

"Not when it's Xehanort," Namine said, crumpling up the picture.

"What does Xehanort have to do with this?" Kairi asked.

"Undoubtedly, it's Xehanort's fault," Riku said.

"He killed her family," Axel said, quietly.

There was a general hiss of disapproval that went around the group.

"I suppose you didn't have to share that," Kairi said quietly, being the first to speak. "That's rather personal information."

Axel shrugged. "It's probably necessary for you to understand her general distrust of Keyblade Wielders."

"Then we just need to prove we're trustworthy!" Sora exclaimed.

"I don't want you to all pounce on her at once!" Axel groaned.

"What, afraid of bringing her home to this slightly dysfunctional family?" Xion teased.

"Slightly?" Roxas coughed.

"True," Xion admitted. "I mean, we've got Madam-Bright-Princess Kairi, Stuck-in-her-Sketchbook Namine, Brooding Riku…"

If Kairi and Namine objected to their spur-of-the-moment nicknames, neither of them said anything. Though, both of them were rather engrossed in their projects. Riku, however, frowned upon being called 'brooding.' He'd like to think he'd moved past that.

"Go-Get-Em Sora," Xion continued. "Memorize-Me Axel. Uh, Random-Replica Xion…"

"I don't think you're random," Roxas said.

Xion shrugged. "I am the only full replica."

"So?"

She shrugged again.

"What am I?" Roxas asked.

Xion blushed, then giggled.

"Reasons why I actually am pursuing a girl!" Axel exclaimed, interrupting everyone. "You guys are all coupled off and I don't like being a seventh wheel!"

The others exchanged glances.

"Would you be willing to have her meet us in smaller groups?" Kairi asked, trying to be helpful.

"It would certainly be less stressful, I think," Axel said. "But that's _if _and only _if _she wants to meet you guys."

"We're your…" Xion began.

"Friends, I get it," Axel finished.

"Friends don't let relationships get in the way of friends," Riku said, quietly.

"Uh, Riku…" Sora began.

"You and Kairi never got in the way of us," Riku said. "We were beyond that. We were too busy trying to kill Xehanort. It doesn't count."

"Ah," Sora said, resettling in the sand.

"I'll talk to Kuin," Axel said. "Next time I see her."

"That shouldn't be too long," Roxas teased.

"How do you figure?" Axel asked.

"You're determined and stubborn," Xion said.

"And you're not?" Axel joked.

This got them all laughing.

"Am I done being interrogated now?" Axel asked.

"Yeah, I think we're done," Roxas said.

"Finished another!" Kairi said, holding up a bright blue Wayfinder.

"Who's that for?" Riku asked.

"You'll find out when I've got all of them done," Kairi said with a mischievous grin.

Riku sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Shouldn't you be done with those now?" he asked, almost playfully.

"I would have been, if I hadn't stopped to make the dual charms. Aqua gave me a simple book of charms and those did prove to be helpful!"

"Yeah, the King was quite grateful!" Xion said.

Kairi nodded. "I'm almost done with the Wayfinders. Then all of us will have one."

Sora reached over and grabbed Kairi's hand. The two of them locked eyes and smiled.

"And that is my cue to leave," Axel said, heaving himself up out of the sand. He looked up at the sky to see roughly how much time had passed. The sky had started to take on a pinkish color.

"Time for a nap," he mused.

"Let's start a bonfire!" Xion said.

"Not with my sketchbook around!" Namine said.

"At least let me use the picture of Xehanort as something to start it with," Xion said.

"Be my guest," Namine said, starting to stand up.

Sora began humming some tune that none of the rest of them recognized. Riku jumped to his feet to help Namine up. Once they were both standing, she gathered up her things.

"Forgive me for not staying through the bonfire," she said, holding up her sketchbook.

"I get it," Xion said, arranging the crumpled drawing of Xehanort along with some dry leaves on top of a few logs that had been nearby.

Once Namine was a reasonable distance away, Xion cupped her hands over the kindling.

"Fire," she said.

"You know," Axel said, stretching. "I could have…"

"Shh," Xion said. "I like using magic."

"Whatever," Axel said.

With that, he started to head back to the main island for his nap, no longer caring about the rest of them.

Namine and Riku were already in a boat on their way back. Xion and Roxas were adding more kindling to the fire, even though the magic would probably keep the flame going longer than an ordinary one. Kairi and Sora had moved ever-so-slightly away from the other two, still close enough to the fire to be included, but far enough away for a moment's privacy. They were still holding hands.

Unsurprisingly, Axel's thoughts drifted off to Kuin, and how she had bandaged him up not all that long ago. He thought about her reaction to his friends. He knew she was apprehensive about any and all Keyblade Wielders. But now it was going to be nearly impossible to keep her and them apart for much longer. Perhaps he should start with introducing her to Namine. Namine, at least, didn't Wield. However, Namine had enough other quirks about her that her lack of Wielding became almost moot when it came to introductions of this sort.

Maybe Kairi would be a better option. Kairi was a Princess and unfailingly kind unless given a reason otherwise.

He certainly wouldn't start with Sora or Riku. And they wouldn't be offended by this in the slightest. Which was a plus.

Maybe just him and Roxas. Best friends. Roxas was more predictable than Xion, too. There was no telling when Xion would just get in a stubborn mood that could potentially tip the balance on the fragile scale he was walking on—nothing against Xion, but she had no filter, ever.

Roxas would make the most sense all around. A small start for Kuin, an easily understandable decision because he and Axel were, after all, best friends. Roxas would be pleased, Kuin could meet a relatively level-headed (provided he wasn't angered) Keyblade Wielder and then he could slowly warm her up to the rest.

Yes, that seemed like the best course of action. But first, that nap.


	56. Shrouding Dark Cloud

**Author's Note: **So... I just posted a blog post about the LAST chapter to Posterous like... ten minutes ago. Currently, Posterous is showing me that the post doesn't exist. But, I know it does. It'll show up. In other news, here's this chapter!

* * *

><p>"Hopefully, there is food after this."<p>

xx

_ "Master Eraqus!" Terra shouted, chasing after the bit of light in his heart that he knew to be his former Master. "Master! Please!" he pleaded. "Wait!"_

_ However, the sliver of light did not wait. It kept moving. _

_ Terra continued running after the sliver. He couldn't lose it…_

_ He was being blocked by a gruesome Keyblade. He knew that Keyblade… he had wielded it when Xehanort had possessed him…_

_ "You!" he spat, staring up at the face of Xehanort. _

_ Xehanort's yellow eyes glinted with malice._

_ Terra drew his own Keyblade. _

_ "That will do you no good, boy; you won't reach your dying Master."_

_ "Master Eraqus!" Terra shouted once again._

_ Xehanort laughed._

_ "Terra!" Master Eraqus called._

_"Master Eraqus!"_

_ "Terra!"_

_ "Master…"_

"Terra!"

It was Aqua shouting.

Terra sat bolt up.

"Aqua…"

"You were dreaming…" she said softly.

"It was more of a nightmare," Terra groaned, rubbing his head.

Almost on instinct, the two of them looked over to where Ven was, still curled up in a ball in the grass.

"Sometimes I feel that this isn't fair to him," Terra said. "Sleeping on the ground and all. I mean, he's still just a kid."

"He wouldn't let us leave him behind," Aqua pointed out, smiling a tad.

Terra nodded in agreement.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Aqua asked.

"Hmm?"

"Your nightmare?"

Terra sighed. He didn't really want to talk about it. But he probably should.

"I was chasing after Master Eraqus," Terra said. "But then Xehanort was keeping me from getting to him… I drew my Keyblade against Xehanort, but there wasn't anything I could do. We hadn't even started fighting and I had the feeling that there wasn't anything I could do."

"Xehanort is not still in your heart, Terra," Aqua said.

"How did you know I was thinking that?"

"It's the most logical thing for you to be thinking. But he can't hurt you Terra. You or Master Eraqus."

"How can you be sure?"

"He's dead, Terra."

"At the risk of sounding redundant…" Terra began.

"How do I know that, Terra?" Aqua asked, a grim smile creeping onto her face. "Because I helped end him myself."

"Xehanort is persistent."

"I know," Aqua said. "I know the man that he turned into when he…" She tripped on her words. "When he got a hold of you."

Terra grimaced.

"He tried to kill me…" she whispered, for the first time admitting that event out loud.

"I know," Terra said. "I was still awake."

Aqua's eyes widened.

"I tried to fight him, even then…"

"Stop," Aqua said. "Do you remember what I said?"

"Hmm?" Terra asked.

"Do you remember what I swore to Xehanort?"

"You said a lot of things," Terra said.

Aqua rolled her eyes.

"I told him that he would have to give back my friend's heart, or pay the price."

"Ah."

"I know Xehanort is dead because I personally helped end him and there was no way I was going to let him live after everything he did."

"And you saved me."

"That was the plan," Aqua said.

They were quiet for a minute, listening to the sounds of the birds slowly waking up in the morning light. They had camped out in the woods nearby the town that was now ruled by Cinderella and her Prince. They had yet to go searching for the Keyhole.

Out of habit, Terra summoned his Keyblade. He liked seeing how much it had repaired itself. Nearly all the cracks had disappeared, save for one that ran from the hilt to the tip. And even it had taken on a less jagged appearance.

"How does yours look?" he asked, looking at Aqua.

She summoned hers. It had few tiny cracks here and there from disuse. The cracks had nothing to do with the state of her heart.

"They're almost all gone," she said. "But they've looked like that for a while."

"Hmm," Terra mused. "I wonder why that is."

"I think they're waiting for yours to finish mending," she said.

"Why do you say that?" Terra asked.

_Because, in my heart, I know that you'll feel better about the crack in your Keyblade if there are cracks in mine as well, _Aqua thought to herself. She dared not say that out loud, however. She didn't think Terra would like that as an answer very much.

Terra frowned at her immediate lack of response.

"Are our hearts that connected, do you think?" he asked, trying to prompt her into _any _sort of answer.

She shrugged. "Perhaps. Maybe it's Master Eraqus."

Terra sighed. "I think he's nearly gone."

"What makes you say that?"

"My dream. He was just a sliver. Before, when I would see him in my dreams, he had more of a presence."

"Are you sure that's not just the fact that Xehanort was in your dream as well?"

Terra shrugged.

"King Mickey said that Master Eraqus' heart would fade over time," Aqua said.

"I know that," Terra said. "I'm just, I'm sad to let him go. I owe him my life…"

Aqua sighed. "I think maybe we all do."

"He was like a father to me," Terra said. "He even said I was like a son to him."

Aqua smiled. "Then isn't it appropriate that his heart bound to yours?"

"I suppose it is. I just wish it could have lasted longer."

Aqua grimaced. "If you think about it…"

"Yeah," Terra said. "I know. It lasted quite a long time."

"As long as Ven's heart was in Sora, really. Give or take a couple of days…"

"Hours," Terra corrected. "It couldn't have been more than hours either way."

Aqua almost laughed at Terra's insistence on the timetable.

"Ven's heart wasn't damaged at least," Terra mused, looking over at their sleeping friend.

_Ven hadn't died… _Aqua found herself thinking. _His heart had a body to go back to. It's a miracle Master Eraqus' heart did what it did…_

"The heart is a funny thing," she found herself saying aloud.

"Yes, yes it is."

The sun was peeking through the trees now. The three of them really should get moving, but neither Aqua nor Terra had the heart to wake Ven up just yet. Aqua had just been saying the other day that a growing boy needs his sleep. To which Ven had complained that he wasn't really growing anymore—not that he could tell at least. Terra and Aqua had laughed, teasing him about how he might actually want to get to be the same height as Terra. Ven had only shrugged that off, slipping into complaints about not being tired.

How their life had changed. In some ways, it was exactly the same as it had been back at the Land of Departure. The three of them teased each other, they trained with Keyblades together, they worked as a team, they never left each other's side except for the few moments of privacy that Aqua seemed to require—but they ate together, slept alongside each other, moved with each other.

Yet, in other ways, so much had changed. The lack of Master Eraqus was only one way. Terra and Aqua had turned into the primary caretakers for Ven, who was slowly becoming old enough to walk even with them and not need a caretaker. In fact, if it wasn't for Aqua, he probably would have forgone any form of caretaking whatsoever. He would argue that Sora hasn't had someone looking after him for the past two years…

If nothing else, the three of them had gotten what they had wanted: a life together, spent under the same sky; the same stars.

Eventually though, this mission would end. Then what?

No one had bothered to think about that just yet.

Ven began to stir.

"Aw," he said, looking up at the sky. "I missed another sunrise!"

He scrambled to a sitting position, trying to see exactly how much of the sunrise he had missed, which was pretty much all of the good part. He sighed, frowning.

"We weren't aware you had wanted to see one," Aqua said, a smile playing on her lips.

Ven nodded emphatically, turning around to look at the two of them. "I think they're cool!"

"You think everything is cool, Ven," Terra teased.

"Not everything," Ven argued. "Heartless are _not _cool."

"Technically," Aqua said. "They are cold, as in an absence of warmth and all…"

"I know what cold means, Aqua," Ven said, his eyes narrowing.

She shrugged, laughing a little.

Ven sighed.

"Can you wake me for tomorrow's sunrise?" Ven said.

"Assuming there's a sunrise wherever we are tomorrow morning," Terra said.

This only made Ven frown more.

"How about this," Aqua said. "Next sunrise we see that you're missing, we'll wake you for. Deal?"

Ven grinned from nearly ear to ear. "Deal!"

He and Aqua shook on it.

"Should we get moving, then?" Terra said. "We have no leads on this Keyhole."

"I think we should ask the Princess," Ven said. "They always seem to have some special connection to the Keyhole."

"It's the best thing we've got so far," Terra said.

"I'm not saying anything against it," Aqua said. "Let's go."

The three of them gathered up their things and started heading into town.

"So," Ven began. "Do you think I'll get a new Keyblade anytime soon?"

"A new Keyblade?" Aqua asked. "What do you mean by that?"

"You know," Ven said. "Like a new design or something."

"Ven," Terra said. "Keyblades take on a representation of the Wielder's heart. You don't get to choose what they look like, the Keyblade decides for itself what form it's going to take."

"Oh," Ven said. "It's just, both you guys have different ones now from the ones you started with."

"Yours will undoubtedly take on a new form eventually," Aqua said. "Everyone's heart grows and their Keyblade will change to reflect that."

"If it really bothers you, just attach some gear or something," Terra said.

"I want it to truly change though," Ven said.

"Then there's nothing you can do but wait," Aqua replied. "It'll happen. Trust me."

"Just," Terra began. "Be prepared for what it's going to take for your heart to grow."

Ven winced. "Right."

"Don't worry him," Aqua chided.

Before Terra had a chance to respond, they made it into the town. It was just coming alive for the morning.

"Let's find something for breakfast first," Terra said.

"Good idea!" Ven agreed. "I'm starving!"

"We should probably buy potions and whatnot first," Aqua said. "Just in case."

Ven and Terra both sighed quite audibly.

"We need to keep an eye on our munny stock," she argued.

They sighed again.

"We should just go someplace and find a whole ton of Heartless that drop munny," Ven said. "That way we won't have to worry about this."

"Don't start talking about Heartless in a place like this," Terra said. "We'll start running into them. And that's exactly what we don't want."

"Excellent," Aqua said. "There's the item shop." She pointed to a little shop on their left with potion bottles in the window. "Let's go!"

"Hopefully there's food after this," Ven mumbled. To which Terra laughed.


	57. Darkness Released

**Author's Note: **Nothing much to say... Porting the blog over from Posterous to Blogger because Posterous is sucking. I'm operating both blogs at the moment (and balancing exams) don't expect too much activity for a few more days... The link to the new blog is the same as the old one, just replace ".posterous" with ".blogspot". I'll put the link in my profile... Other than that, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"I suppose you probably do need me."<p>

xx

"Oh you came!" Aerith exclaimed. "I wasn't sure you were going to respond to my invitation."

Aerith opened the door wide to let Ienzo in. Tifa looked up from setting the table and nodded at the newcomer. Quistis was the only other one in the main area. She was sitting on one of the couches, reading. She and Ienzo did little to acknowledge one another.

"It would be rude not to come," Ienzo replied.

"I invited Pi as well," Aerith mused. "Could he not come?"

"Someone had to tend the shop," Ienzo said. "I can't afford to lose business. I hardly get enough as it is."

"People come so late at night?" Tifa asked.

Ienzo nodded. "It is a book and magic shop, after all."

"You might get better business when there's less Heartless about," Rinoa said, appearing at the top of the stairs.

"Is that why you invited me over?" Ienzo quipped. "To get me to officially agree to help you guys."

"_I _invited you over to dinner," Aerith said tersely. "It's what neighbors do."

Ienzo's nostrils flared.

"Now, now," Tifa said. "Let's everyone just calm down. Dinner hasn't even started."

"Are fights common at dinner?" Ienzo mused, almost to himself.

"You can say that again," Leon said, joining Rinoa at the top of the stairs.

Just then, Yuffie, Cloud and Zack walked through the front door.

"You know," Yuffie said. "You two make rounds really hard when you two start showing off."

"Not again!" Aerith exclaimed.

"Cloud!" Tifa said. "You know better!"

"What's the status on the Heartless?" Rinoa asked, starting down the stairs.

"Pure blood," Cloud replied. "The usual."

"One of the Poolers took my munny," Yuffie complained. "I didn't have a chance to snatch it up before it sucked it away!"  
>"Better the munny than you," Zack pointed out.<p>

Yuffie wouldn't hear it.

"How long does that make it since we've seen an Emblem?" Aerith mused.

None of the rest of them had an answer.

"It was before we went to Castle Oblivion to help with the Xehanort problem," Yuffie said. "That's for sure."

"No," Leon argued. "There were Emblems after that, that's just when we started noticing them disappearing."

"That's because the machine that makes the Emblems has been disabled," Ienzo said. "Or, rather, machines. Since there are two. But both of them have been disabled, therefore, no new Emblems are being produced to be sent out into the worlds."  
>"Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?" Tifa asked.<p>

"No more Heartless are being manufactured," Cloud said. "I would think that's a good thing."

"That doesn't stop the Heartless being formed by the darkness though," Leon said.

Cloud only allowed his disappointment at being wrong show on his face for a second.

"Dinner's ready!" Cid called from somewhere in the kitchen.

"See, told you we'd make it back in time," Zack said, punching Cloud on the shoulder.

"You make it sound like I had doubts!" Cloud replied, laughing.

Aerith and Tifa exchanged smiles.

Everyone took their seats around the table as Tifa, Aerith and Cid brought out the meal. Ienzo found himself sitting next to Rinoa and across from Aerith as she took her seat.

"Is Merlin going to be joining us?" Quistis asked.

"I told him he could come if he wanted," Aerith said.

Cid frowned.

"Let it go, Cid," Leon cautioned.

Just then, Merlin appeared at the opposite end of the table as Cid, armchair and all.

"We seem to have a visitor," Merlin said.

"Hello," Ienzo said, nodding his head to his right, seeing as Merlin was now just around the corner of the table from him.

"Ienzo," Aerith said. "I have a question for you."

Ienzo raised an eyebrow.

"You've grown up in Hollow Bastion, you've been in and out of it as much as we have, what do you think in the obvious increase of darkness."

"We haven't seen darkness this bad since Xehanort was around sending it out," Leon said.

"Or that stint with Hollow Bastion's fall," Cid said. "But that's a combination of Xehanort and Maleficent, wouldn't you think?"

"Regardless," Leon said. "We completely talked over Ienzo."

Leon looked over Rinoa to make eye contact with Ienzo, who was deep in thought.

"Well, it is certainly true that the darkness has been more prevalent as of late," he said.

"I thought killing Xehanort would have made most of this darkness go away," Yuffie complained. "Instead it's only gotten worse."

Ienzo bit the inside of his cheek. He knew _exactly _what was causing this. He cursed himself internally for taking so long to figure it out. Xehanort had it rigged so that all the worlds containing any of his research would begin to leech darkness in order to destroy the research and keep others from finding it. Ienzo himself, combined with the help of Even, and later Vexen, had collaborated with Xehanort to set it up. Hollow Bastion was one of the three worlds. The World that Never Was was probably experiencing problems as well, just no one had noticed it because the world was quite desolate. Castle Oblivion probably began to show the early warning signs, but given the amount of Vexen Replicas present there, they'd probably reversed the effects, leaving Castle Oblivion in its current state of skewed balance.

Hollow Bastion, however, was neither desolate, nor crawling with Replicas that were immune to darkness effects and could therefore go straight to the heart of the leaking darkness and quell it. Then again, given the way Castle Oblivion worked, the Vexen Replicas could have very easily stemmed the darkness from the control room, without having to go to wherever it had begun to leak.

But back to the case of Hollow Bastion. There were people living here and trying to make their lives here, Ienzo included. And there was no master control room to stop the darkness. They would have to get to the castle. They would have to go to the castle, find the computer, and activate the DTP, cancelling out the DCP that was currently in effect.

Ienzo groaned. He was going to have to help. If he didn't do something or, at the very least, tell someone, Hollow Bastion was going to be left in ruins.

His groan had alerted everyone else at the table to his musings. They were all staring at him with inquisitive eyes.

Now came the true test. He wanted to alert them all to what was going on, but he had to do so in a way that didn't make him look like a criminal. Since this was, in part, his own fault, given his state of paranoia when it came to research.

"The castle," he said. "The darkness is coming from the castle."

He half expected someone to say something along the lines of: "No, really, we hadn't figured that out!" in a very sarcastic manner.

Then he realized that none of the people sitting around him had any relation to Vexen.

"I would believe that," Rinoa said, her face drawn as she thought. "That would align with what I've been seeing from the air the past couple of weeks. The Heartless are thickest by the castle."

"We haven't had any luck breaking through," Leon said. "We're too busy keeping the town clear."

"I'm going to assume we need to get to the castle to stop the darkness coming from it?" Tifa said, looking at Ienzo.

Ienzo nodded. "Someone has to go and activate the DTP."

"The what?" Yuffie asked.

"Darkness Termination Program. It will cancel out the DCP."

Before she even had a chance to ask…

"Darkness Creation Program."

"Why'n the name of all th' Ancients is there a Darkness Creation Program activated?" Cid hollered, slamming his fork down on the table so hard he actually drove a couple of points into the wood. Zell hastily moved his hand away.

"Xehanort wanted one in effect to destroy all of his research in the event of his demise," Ienzo replied quietly.

"Who would come up with such a thing?" Tifa asked, almost in disgust.

"Xehanort," Cloud replied simply.

Ienzo decided he'd let them think that it was all Xehanort's idea.

"How much of the research would you say is already destroyed?" Leon asked.

"Doubtful any is yet," Ienzo said. "The point of the DCP is really to just eradicate the entire world, plunging it into darkness so the research is lost forever. Theoretically, all the research is still intact. Does it matter?"

"Collecting any of Xehanort's research might not be a bad idea," Leon said.

"I don't think that should be our first priority," Aerith argued. "Didn't Ienzo _just say _that the point of the DCP is to plunge this world into darkness? I don't know about you, but I'm more interested in stopping _that _than finding some of stupid Xehanort's research."

Silence fell around the table.

"You and I were both around when Hollow Bastion was plunged into darkness the first time," Aerith continued, her own fork quivering in her grasp.

"I was there, too," Yuffie whispered. No one heard her, or if they did, they didn't pay any attention to her. She didn't seem all that surprised though.

"I'm not too inclined to live through that again," Aerith said. She looked at Ienzo. "How long do we have?"

"A month," Ienzo said. "Maybe two. We'll be able to tell when people start losing their hearts."

"The usual signs," Leon whispered, now on track with everyone else around the table, forgetting completely his ideas about obtaining any of Xehanort's research.

"We need to stop that program," Tifa said. "Or start the other one. Whatever it takes."

"Starting the termination program will cancel out the creation one, right?" Rinoa asked.

Ienzo nodded, not bothering to point out that he had, in fact, said that. Not everyone thought like he did.

"So, then, we get to the castle," Zack said. "We go in, we find out how to activate the DTP and all the problems are solved."

"I doubt it's that simple," Cloud said, looking at Ienzo.

"Well, yes, it is that simple," Ienzo said. "But first, you have to get to the castle."

"Storming the castle!" Yuffie shouted.

"Well, maybe if we launched a concentrated attack on just one path to the castle," Leon said. "We can break through long enough for a couple of people to get to the computer in there."

"I wish we had kept the route to the castle clear," Aerith mused. "Maybe we wouldn't be in such a mess."

"Xehanort would have killed us getting back in there, you know it," Leon said.

"That software was in there long before Xehanort came back to Hollow Bastion," Ienzo said.

"How come it hasn't been activated until now?" Rinoa asked.

"Simple, Xehanort wasn't dead yet."

"So, back to planning the concentrated assault," Zack said.

"Isn't there a rule against planning battles at the dinner table?" Yuffie said.

"I'm willing to ignore that rule right now," Aerith said.

Zack, Cloud, Leon and Cid all exchanged rather excited looks. Then they began planning.

"Will you be helping us?" Aerith said, looking at Ienzo.

"I'm sure he would be a valuable asset," Merlin said, speaking for the first time throughout the entire conversation. "I'm sure he has more expansive knowledge of the castle than any of the rest of us."

"Will you be coming?" Tifa asked, looking at Merlin.

"Only if you have need for me," Merlin said, shrugging. "Cid there doesn't particularly like it when I help on missions."

Thankfully, Cid was too busy planning some rather elaborate piece of the current stratagem with Zack to be paying attention to Merlin's words.

"Would you be willing to help if we needed you?" Tifa asked.

"Of course! Of course!" Merlin said. "Why wouldn't I be of assistance?"

"Good to hear!" Aerith said.

"Ienzo," Tifa said. "What about you?"

"I suppose you do probably need me," Ienzo said, biting back the groan that was rising up inside of him. He did not want to be doing this. He just wanted to settle down… in his little shop…

Aerith and Tifa were still staring at him, not satisfied with the answers he had provided so far.

"Fine, I'll help," Ienzo said.


	58. Something Fishy

**Author's** **Note: **So, life is certainly crazy for me right now. It's not even 'hell-week', it's 'fortnight of purgatory'. Thank my friend Shiny for that. This chapter was not one I struggled with, thankfully. I only struggled with finding time to write it down. Once I found the time, it practically wrote itself.

Anyway, still managing two blogs at the moment. Trying to get all the character corners and other important posts ported over to Blogger before I start putting chapter commentary up there. Current chapter commentary will still be going up on Posterous. And I probably won't port it over later. I'm not planning on porting chapter commentaries and little posts unless there is a desperate need to do so. If there are posts that you'd LIKE to have ported over, lemme know.

Review responses will be with the chapter commentary!

And, with that, onto the chapter itself:

* * *

><p>"They're going to freak out, aren't they?"<p>

xx

Kairi and Namine walked carefully on top of the buildings in The World that Never Was. Kairi had her Keyblade drawn already. Namine walked quietly alongside Kairi, getting tabs on all the Heartless they already knew they were there.

"Haven't you gotten yourself a knife yet?" Kairi asked.

"I talked to Riku about it, he agreed that it was a good idea. However, about the time we were going to actually go do something about it, we ended up in the other universe. We haven't quite found the time yet."

"I suppose you and I could go after we do clean up here," Kairi suggested. "Unless you really wanted to go with Riku."

Namine shrugged. "I suppose I kind of do."

Kairi shrugged it off. "I understand."

The two of them reached the edge of the skyscraper they were on. They peered down below.

"Sheesh," Kairi muttered. "Cid wasn't lying when he said there was a Heartless problem here."

"Neoshadows," Namine mused. "Roxas' favorite."

"How can you have a favorite Heartless?" Kairi asked.

Namine shrugged. "I don't know, but Roxas loves killing Neoshadows."

"How do you suppose we go about killing these guys?" Kairi asked. "I am nowhere _near _as good with a Keyblade as Roxas is."

"It'd be best with multiple Keyblades anyway," Namine mused, only halfway in the moment. She was drawing out images in her head. She was staring blankly off into space above the other skyscrapers.

"How do you know that?" Kairi asked, turning to look at Namine.

"I've seen this scene before with Roxas and Riku. Roxas was dual-wielding," she laughed to herself a tad. "Funnily enough, I've seen it from both of their memories by now."

"Namine, I'm not Roxas or Riku, nor do I have two Keyblades. Any ideas on how we're going to take care of _this _batch of Neoshadows?"

"There is our combo," Namine suggested.

"Yes, but it's rather a final resort when it's just the two of us," Kairi argued.

Namine shrugged. "Simply a suggestion."

"I do have a few more of these left," Kairi said, pulling out four of the charms Aqua had given her. "Xion and I just split the ones we have left."

"There's still eight charms?" Namine asked.

Kairi nodded. "Aqua gave us quite a bit. You and I could easily use one of them and no one would complain."

Namine cocked her head to one side, thinking. She was about ready to select a charm when the sound of disappearing Heartless distracted them both. The two of them quickly turned to see over the edge of the building once again. Sure enough, the Neoshadows were disappearing.

"How is that…?" Kairi began.

"Someone's controlling them," Namine said.

The two girls looked at each other.

"Who?"

Whoever was making the Heartless disappear, however, did not feel the need to show themselves though at that particular moment. Rather, an army of Nobodies in the forms of Dusks and Creepers showed up. Namine didn't even get a chance to search for the person who was controlling either group—maybe even both.

"Can Nobodies make Heartless disappear?" Kairi mused.

"Not the lesser ones, no," Namine replied. "In smaller cases, you'll see a group of Nobodies launch an attack on a small group of Heartless in a pitiful attempt to capture the hearts that the Heartless contain; but no, that's not what's happening here…"

"Then what is?"

The Nobodies began to appear on top of the building the two girls were on as well.

"Uh, so about those charms," Namine said, not answering Kairi's question.

Kairi fished the charms out of her pocket. "Pick one."

Namine looked them over for about two seconds before latching onto a blue-white one. The charm activated.

Kairi disappeared. Namine now found herself holding Kairi's Keyblade. Except, now it looked thinner, like glass. It also glowed with immense light.

"Kairi!" Namine said, sounding a tad panicked. She had no idea what to do. All she knew is that she was now standing there alone with a Keyblade.

_I'm here, _Kairi said. _Just go with it._

Namine raised her arms. She found that something was moving alongside her. She had wings… no, she had _Keyblades_ for wings. Six of them surrounded her.

_I find this incredibly ironic, _she mused. _That the girl who claims she should not wield a Keyblade suddenly wields six._

_ Just attack!_

A Dusk lashed out at Namine. She jumped up into the air, suddenly jumping much higher than she usually could because of the combo. She lashed back at it with Kairi's Keyblade. Or was it her Keyblade now? It was hard to really say.

The Dusks started launching themselves at her now, she decided that evasion was the best idea at the moment. She glided through them easily, her feet only occasionally touching the ground. Her Keyblade-Wings seemed to grant her a temporary gift of flight. The combo probably came with the Glide ability, now that she thought about it.

She tried to think of her next move for attack.

_Just launch yourself into that cluster of them, _Kairi said. _You'll probably kill some and certainly scatter the rest._

Namine did so. Sure enough, several Dusks didn't survive the impact and the rest were sent scattering. Namine sliced with the Keyblade. Not only did the one she was holding in her hands slice through some Dusks (and Creepers, as she now noticed them) but two of the Keyblades from behind her back sliced as well. Not only were they wing-like substances. They were weapons as well.

The Dusks and Creepers recovered from their momentary stunning and started coming after her again. She pulled a second Keyblade from behind her back and dual-wielded her way through them like she had seen Roxas do to Neoshadows so many times in memories. It was rather effective.

One of the Keyblades was knocked from her hand. However, rather than clattering to the ground like she expected it to, it merely joined the ones behind her back. To test a theory, she let go of the other Keyblade and it went behind her back as well. She smirked.

"Let's see how telekinetic all of this is," she mused.

First, she used the Keyblades as a shield to block one of the Dusks from napping at her by holding one hand in front of her face and the other in front of her chest. Then, she thrust one hand out in front of her in a half-chopping, half-slicing motion. The Keyblades followed suit, taking out several Nobodies with ease. After each attack, the Keyblades returned to their position behind Namine's back.

_Add some light to the attacks!_

Namine selected a Keyblade and shot a beam full of light at a group of Creepers. It, too, was effective. Namine repeated the process four times.

_I love this combo!_

_ Don't get too cocky! _Namine warned, having to use the Keyblades as a shield again. A few Dusks had slithered through her defenses while she was busy attacking clusters of Creepers.

She grabbed a Keyblade once more and set off a bigger blast of light, one that almost left her falling backwards. She regained her balance and took stock of the remaining Nobodies.

Many of them. A great many of them.

_Where are they coming from?_

_ The Keyblade attracts some of them, I know that…_

_ But they showed up before we were even really fighting!_

_ Yes, but you had your Blade drawn._

_ Explain why the Heartless disappeared first, though._

_ …_

Namine didn't even respond to Kairi as she reached out with her mind, trying to see if she could find the person summoning all the Nobodies, for that was the only logical explanation for all of this. However, the large amount of Dusks and Creepers all around her skewed with her senses and she was unable to make out anything different than the base Nobody minds.

_Ow! _Kairi wailed. _That hurts!_

Namine stopped searching instantly. _Sorry! _she cried. _I didn't realize that would happen! Don't let me start shattering anything either like this…_

_ ! _

That was all Namine could make out of Kairi's response.

Searching for any idea of what to do, Namine selected a Keyblade again, charged it with light and sent it barreling off at a group of Nobodies. It landed in the middle of them and destroyed them all with a burst of light. The Keyblade however, stayed rooted in the floor beneath them.

Namine bit her lip, but liked the effectiveness of this particular attack. So she repeated the process with the rest of the Keyblades, sending them out in all different directions around them, destroying the Nobodies.

_Pity you can't manipulate space and send them through that like Xigbar used to do… _Kairi mused.

_Wouldn't that just be fun? _Namine replied. _How do you suppose I get the blades back._

_ Summon them. Easy._

_ How do I go about doing that?_

_ Just think… summoning thoughts…_

Namine did so. For good measure, she made a motion with her hand.

Like obedient pets, all seven Keyblades returned to their wing-positions behind Namine's back.

"Quite effective," she said to herself.

_Now what? _Kairi asked, internally gesturing at the ridiculous amount of clusters of Nobodies.

"This," Namine replied out loud.

She threw her arms out on either side of her, letting out a giant burst of light. The Keyblades flew out to the extent of the light burst, striking into the ground and sending off pillars and shockwaves of their own. Any Dusk or Creeper in the middle of the attack disappeared instantly. Namine stomped her foot, furthering the burst of light.

When the light faded, there weren't any more Nobodies.

Kairi appeared next to Namine as the Keyblades disappeared. Namine simply stood still, taking in everything that had just happened. Out of a mild paranoia, Kairi summoned her Keyblade once again. It came to her hands readily.

"That was wicked," Kairi said.

Namine nodded.

"Where do you suppose all those Nobodies came from?"

"I couldn't find who sent them."

"Are you sure that someone sent them?"

Namine nodded. "A bunch of Nobodies appearing in The World that Never Was is not strange. But a bunch of Nobodies appearing right _after _a whole ton of Heartless disappearing _is _strange. Someone had to either make the Heartless disappear for the Nobodies to appear, or they were somehow in charge of both. The latter is more likely."

"Why would someone want to summon a whole bunch of Nobodies here?"

"Because we were here."

Kairi locked eyes with Namine. The question was not 'why would someone want us?' Both girls could come up with innumberable reasons as to why someone would want a Princess of Heart or a Memory Witch or, simply, just two girls with connections to people like Sora or Riku. Instead, the question was: '_who _wants us?'

"Hades has control of the Dusks," Kairi stated. "Could he possibly be able to control the Creepers as well."

"It wouldn't surprise me. Why do you suppose Hades would have sent a bunch of them after us though?"

"We did make him rather angry last week…"

"And if he somehow knew that we knew he could control them, he would probabably want to quell that information from getting out if he's planning on using it to take over Disney Castle…"

"Rather than try and figure out Hades' motives, assuming it is Hades…" Kairi began. "We have a slightly bigger issue on our hands…"

"Yes?"

"Do we tell Sora and Riku? _Someone _is sending Nobodies after us."

Namine frowned. "Do you suppose it's just us?"

Kairi shrugged. "It could be, it could not be. Which means we probably should tell them. Our other option being, if this happens again, which it probably will if we're correct that someone is after us, letting Sora and Riku figure this out when we're out with them and we have a whole ton of Nobodies after us."

"They're going to freak out, aren't the?" Namine said.

Kairi frowned. "Yes, they probably are."


	59. Struggle Away

**Author's Note: **So, chapter's a little later than I wanted it posted. Three weeks of midterm h***. Mlarg. Whatever, chapter's done and up. A good strong one with Axel :) I... uh... don't know if I had anything else to say. If I remember something, I'll post it in the blog. Check Posterous for new blog posts, considering Blogger is currently mostly just character corners and whatnot.

* * *

><p>"Just remember what I told you about not getting killed."<p>

xx

Axel walked through The World that Never Was warily. He had about five Assassins flitting about him, mostly because of the large amounts of Dusks and Creepers milling about. No Dusk or Creeper had made an effort to attack him, even before he had summoned up some Assassins for an extra layer of protection. But he couldn't help but notice the large amount of them.

"Kairi and Namine were just here yesterday," he mused to an Assassin that happened to have looked over at him. "How are they still so many of them?"

The Assassin didn't give any sort of response. Axel pretended that it raised an eyebrow.

"I suppose if someone _is _summoning them though, something is keeping them from attacking me."

A couple of Assassins nipped at his shins.

"Yeah, I guess you guys are helping."

He wasn't sure if the Assassins took offense or not.

He also decided that he just didn't want to think too hard on the Dusk and Creepers potentially attacking. He, personally, wanted to believe that all the Nobodies yesterday out by Memory Skyscraper were flukes. He didn't want to think about the potential of someone else out there controlling them, summoning them, causing problems.

There were enough problems that he had to deal with, thank you very much.

However, chances are, Kairi and Namine were right. Which was great, real great.

Regardless, he had business here in The World that Never Was. There was something he was looking for…

He then cursed himself for not just going straight to the Grey Area. When he had star-sharded in, he had just thought 'The World that Never Was', he hadn't thought to be more specific. _Usually _his star shard took care of the rest. Maybe it was defective after all.

Rather than continue to weave his way through corridors, he pulled out his star shard again. He looked around to the Assassins.

"Keep up."

He activated it for the Grey Area. When he arrived, he was pleased to hear silence. No random Nobodies milling about. None besides the Assassins, anyway.

He made his way over to the Hallway of Bedrooms in it, like he'd done so many times before. Even after becoming a Somebody. However, instead of going to the door that would open when he lit the doorknob on fire, he went across the hallway to a door that had a lock that only opened with a keycard.

Axel supposed a Keyblade would probably do it, but there wasn't a proper lock, hence the Keycard. Saix was paranoid about things like that.

Not that he could be all that paranoid when there were two keys and Axel kept ahold of the one Saix didn't keep with him. Old habits die hard, since this harkened back to the days of Isa and Lea, not Saix and Axel.

Axel had been lucky not to have the key on him when he sacrificed his Nobody self for Sora. There would have been no telling if it would have survived the inferno. The key had been in his bedside table, tucked away because he never would have thought he'd have a use for it again. Turns out he did.

He'd come back for the key weeks ago, but then he'd ran into stupid Marly and he'd lost his desire to go into Saix's room.

Well, now he was here. Before he could second-guess himself, he slid the key into the slot and then pulled it back out again. The little indicator light blipped red.

Axel frowned. "Come on," he argued. "Don't do this to me."

He tried the card again, this time the indicator light blipped green.

"That's better."

He jiggled the handle (this he knew to be stubborn) and the door opened.

"Stand guard," he told the closest assassin.

He wasn't sure what he was looking for. Just something. Anything. Something that would indicate to him that Saix hadn't always been bad.

It was a long shot, he knew that. But… he had the key, he might as well try.

He wasn't sure where to start. Saix's room was vastly plain. The bed had been made, no doubt by Dusks. The shades over the window were drawn wide open and Axel could remember when the artificial Kingdom Hearts could have been seen from the window itself. The closet doors were closed, nothing lay on the dresser or the bedside table.

This was slightly disheartening. There might not be anything of value in here. Axel walked over to the closet and slid open the doors. He sifted through the contents. Cloaks, shoes, gloves. Nothing interesting. There was a box though, stored on the top shelf. Axel reached up and grabbed it. He took it over to the bed and opened it up. It was full of different claymore designs based on different gears. Nothing else. Axel scoffed.

He went over to the dresser. Nothing useful there whatsoever.

He last went over to the bedside table. The two drawers were filled mostly of sketches of the artificial Kingdom Hearts at various stages of its forming. There were some notices that had been written up by Saix that had hung in the Grey Area over the years, including one that clearly stated that Axel was an enemy of the Organization. Axel pocketed this, for reasons he couldn't even explain to himself.

At the bottom of the bottom drawer was a picture of Axel and Saix, shortly after they had joined the Organization. Axel pocketed that as well.

None of this was really what he had been looking for, however. He groaned and plopped down on the bed.

Even the mattress was hard! Unbelievably hard, actually… Axel frowned, stood up, scooted over a foot, and then sat back down. The mattress wasn't as hard.

Axel shoved his hand under the mattress, searching for whatever it was that was causing the mattress to be hard.

He found it!

It was Saix's journal. Everyone in the Organization was required to keep one. Axel's had been a small, leather-bound one. Lightweight and slim. Saix's, however, was a large book-like-substance. Heavy. Clunky. But it was unmistakably Saix's journal, further proven by Saix's scrawl over every page inside.

This, was what Axel had been looking for.

He was about ready to sit back down on the bed and look through it when an annoying, yet unmistakable, scream pierced the air.

What in the name of all that was good in the Worlds was _Larxene _doing here?

Axel pocketed the journal, grateful that his cloak had never-ending pockets. He made his way over to the door and pressed his ear to it, listening.

"Get off! You stupid Assassin!"

Axel stifled a snort.

There was some stomping, some fluttering, a failed lightning bolt and some exasperated noises (all of which came from Larxene).

"No time like the present," Axel muttered. "First Marluxia and then Larxene, I never _can _get any peace around here anymore."

He opened the door, which promptly startled Larxene. Axel fought back yet more laughter.

"Having problems, Larxene?" he asked, letting several notches of cockiness seep into his voice out of habit. He hadn't dealt with Larxene since… well, since he'd blasted her off to Atlantica. He'd known she was back though, Roxas and Xion had mentioned it.

Larxene glared daggers at Axel. He was almost surprised she didn't throw a few.

"What are you doing here?" she spat. "In Saix's old room, no less!"

"Since when is it your business to question me?" Axel asked. "I don't think it ever has been. Yet you insist on sticking your nose where it doesn't belong."

Larxene growled.

"I could just as easily ask _you _what _you're _doing here," Axel continued.

"None of your business!" she spat.

Axel smirked. "Exactly. Just like my business is not yours to interfere with."

"Can you tell your Assassins to get off!" Larxene shrieked, shaking her foot in an attempt to get an Assassin (which had been latched onto her boot) to go flying. She wasn't very successful in her endeavors.

Axel snapped. "Yo, let her be."

The Assassin that had latched onto Larxene as well as the other ones in the area backed off of her. Though they still remained rather close to Axel for another level of protection.

"What happens now?" Axel asked.

"I could fight you," Larxene said.

"But you don't want to," Axel reminded her. "I've never been worth the effort."

"True," Larxene said, standing up to her full height, which was still a head or so shorter than Axel. "But maybe I could win this time."

"Don't think you're the only one that got stronger," Axel scoffed.

Larxene glared, then she laughed. Axel did his best not to wince as she did this. This particular laugh was her most piercingly annoying laugh. She'd used it frequently with the Riku Replica. Or, any other time that she felt like bragging about her powers—most of which happened when the Riku Replica was getting the brunt end of her attacks.

"There are things that have happened to me since re-becoming a Somebody that you could only _dream _of," she told him in a sickly sweet voice. "It would make those spikes on your head _curl_."

Axel raised an eyebrow. "I doubt you even want to know the half of what's happened to me."

She snorted. "Yes, but you work against the darkness. That, alone, makes me stronger. The darkness is a powerful thing, Axel. So unless you're still being a double agent and you're actually working for the darkness—against those Keyblade brats of yours—there is no possible way you could be stronger than me."

Axel snorted. He decided he just wouldn't bring up all the negative effects that the darkness has when there is a heart to be messed with. Anyone who'd had time to look back on their lives post-darkness would agree with him.

Heck, Xehanort probably agreed to a certain degree.

"I've got an idea," Axel said. "You could leave."

"You leave first," Larxene said.

"What does it matter?" Axel said. "I mean, I was leaving anyway, but honestly, what does it matter, who leaves first?"

"Who says I was planning on leaving?" Larxene said.

"You said I'd be leaving first, implying that you were leaving."

Larxene glared. "True."

"_Were _you planning on staying?" Axel asked.

She shrugged. "Hadn't decided yet. Not like I'm going to tell you one way or another if and when I do decide."

"This place is a wreck," Axel said. "I feel that I should tell you. The darkness around here is just running rampant."

Larxene frowned, considering this.

Almost as if to prove his point, several Neoshadows showed up in the hallway.

"That wasn't an invitation," Axel said, summoning his chakrams.

Larxene looked like she could have screamed.

"Too much effort," she said.

With that, she formed a dark corridor around herself and disappeared.

"Well, that solves that problem," Axel said.

A Neoshadow swiped at his boot. Axel glared at it. He counted his Assassins, four at the moment. He then counted the Neoshadows. More than a dozen.

"She's right for once," he snorted. "Too much effort."

He looked at the Assassins. "If you want to try and get their hearts, go for it," he said plainly. "But if you're going to get yourselves killed, don't waste your time. They're not worth it. I've got what I came here for, so I'm leaving."

Whether the Assassins understood his plethora of words, he couldn't be sure. He didn't really care though. He would care if they all got themselves killed on a suicide mission to get hearts though. Four against more than a dozen didn't look like very good odds. But Axel had no reason to stay here and clear out the Heartless. The darkness was strong here because of something to do with Xehanort and his research or something. He remembered something else about them sitting down and trying to decide if this world was worth trying to salvage when they had Hollow Bastion to worry about. Which was kind of why Axel had come back today to grab the journal, just in case there wasn't a tomorrow for this world for him to do that then.

Regardless, he wasn't staying around to fight Heartless. He put his chakrams away and pulled out the star shard.

"You don't have to come with me," he told the Assassins. "Just remember what I told you about not getting killed!"

With that, he activated the star shard to take him directly to his room on Destiny Islands. One Assassin had decided to come with.

"I don't know what you plan on doing here," he told it. "Just don't cause trouble."

It formed a dark corridor and disappeared. Axel stuck his tongue out at where it had been.

"Fine then."

He emptied his pockets and stared at Saix's journal. He wasn't sure if he was ready to read it just yet. It could contain information that would make him feel better, but more likely than not, it wouldn't.

Maybe another day.


	60. Back to the Castle

**Author's Note: **So... funny story... I actually haven't finished this sequence because it's going to be a long one. Usually, I try and finish a sequence before I split it into chapters and stuff, but with this one, I've been putting in chapter breaks as I go, and since it's the next thing to be posted and I'm about ready to start the fifth chapter of this sequence... I just need to start posting. Not that any of you probably really care lol. I'm just rambling because it's Monday morning and I'm NOT studying for my exam that's in an hour...

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"I should have told 34 to turn off the separate battlefields. That would have made this go faster."<p>

xx

"So let me get this straight," Riku said, looking at one of the handsets that Cid had given them for communication purposes. "You need us to go check out Castle Oblivion because of _potential _darkness spikes?"

"Tha's no' what I meant an' you knowwit!" Cid barked. "I _know _there's a spike'n Castle Oblivion. It shoulda been taken care of by those Replicas, but for some reason, i's not been prop'rly taken careof!"

"Is there someone specific that needs to go deal with this?"

Namine looked up from the picture she was drawing. She and Riku happened to be in Castle Oblivion in it, so she could only assume where this conversation was going to go.

"It don' matter who goes," Cid said. "No' really. Jus' a coupa people who can navigate Castle Oblivion well. An' who don' have qualms abou' the darkness."

"I'll go," Riku said. "I don't have problems with the darkness anymore."

"You'll need a backup," Cid said, raising an eyebrow.

"I've got that covered," Riku said.

His thoughts were all centered around Namine. She could tell by all the memories that were floating at the front of his mind.

"Yup," Namine murmured to herself. "Not surprised."

The only reason why Riku didn't hear her was because Cid was ranting about something in particular. After quite a long bit, Riku shushed Cid up and was able to end the call.

"So," Riku said, turning to Namine. "Do you want to go to Castle Oblivion?"

Namine turned her sketchbook around for him to see.

"Right," Riku said. "So you already knew."

"Pretty much."  
>Riku stood up and pulled a star shard out of his pocket. He extended his arm out to help Namine up.<p>

"You don't have to go, you know?" Riku said. "I mean, I know I offered and all, but you and Castle Oblivion have a history. I could just as easily go find Xion or Axel."

"I want to go," Namine said.

Riku smiled a little.

"Mostly so I can be with you," Namine said.

Riku smiled a lot.

"Besides, I know pretty much all of Castle Oblivion. Whatever it is we're looking for, I'm probably the best navigator."

"Agreed," Riku said. "Because those Vexen Replicas are always hit and miss on whether or not they're going to be helpful."

Namine laughed, just a little.

"Well," Riku said, offering out his hand. "Shall we go then?"

Namine smiled. "Yes, let's."

Riku grabbed her hand, made sure that she was all ready, and then activated the star shard. They arrived just outside of the Computer Room. The inside of the Computer Room was proofed so that no corridors or star shards could come in. For security reasons, naturally.

Riku knocked on the door. The two of them hardly waited before 34 opened it. He hardly looked surprised to see them. In fact, he looked rather relieved.

"Please tell me that you're here in regards to the darkness," he said.

Riku and Namine took one look at each other, then looked back at 34 and nodded.

34 gestured them inside the Computer Room.

"I must insist that we're not completely incapable," he said. "We have made an effort to contain it. However, our efforts only go so far. We were actually able to eradicate the darkness in places, but we've had to seal off all of Floor Thirteen in order to prevent it from spreading further."

"Marluxia's quarters," Namine murmured.

"What do you want us to do?" Riku asked.

"Is it too much to ask of you to just go and destroy the darkness?" 34 asked. He was not begging or pleading. He wasn't even asking as if he expected this and so much more of them. He was just asking, honestly.

"We can certainly try," Riku said. "These darkness outbursts are more than what we're used to dealing with."

"42 and I will continue to work with it on the technical end," 34 insisted.

"Thank you for what you've done already," Namine told him.

34 gave a little bow. "Of course, Miss Namine."

Riku stifled a snort. 34 chose to ignore it. Namine decided she'd ask later.

"I'll go hack-and-slash," Riku said.

Namine felt the need to say what she'd be doing, but she wasn't really sure if there was an easy way to explain what she did. Assuming she got a knife sometime soon though… she would be doing her own version of hack-and-slashing. But, not today.

"So, we just need to go up to Floor Thirteen?" Riku asked. "What room is it in?"

"Theoretically, the very deepest corner," 34 replied.

"Quite literally Marluxia's quarters," Namine said.

34 nodded.

"Can we go straight there?" Riku asked.

"Not without a dark corridor," 34 said grimly. "And we had to shut off all access via corridor in order to prevent the darkness from leaking."

"How long has it been like this?" Riku asked.

"Records say only 36 hours," 34 said offhandedly. "It's hard to tell how much time passes here."

"You don't need to remind me," Riku muttered.

"If we can't use a dark corridor to get straight there," Namine began, realizing what 34 had been getting at before Riku sidetracked him. "We'll have to go through…"

"Each individual room, destroying darkness as you go," 34 said.

Namine closed her eyes, taking in exactly what that entailed. "Every room?" she asked, her voice significantly smaller than she would have liked it to be.

"Well, Miss Namine, I'm sure you'll be able to know if there is a shortcut of sorts."

"And Riku will be able to know if we can't take the shortcut due to excessive amounts of darkness."

Riku's nostrils twitched almost expectantly.

"We'll need map cards," Namine said.

34 nodded and went rummaging through desk drawers. He pulled a stack of cards. Namine and Riku noticed the large amount of red cards, interrupted only occasionally by a blue, green or gold card. 34 handed the stack to Namine, who promptly began looking through them, muttering the names of the cards as she went.

"Teeming Darkness, Almighty Darkness, Teeming Darkness, Looming Darkness, Bottomless Darkness, Mingling Worlds, Teeming Darkness… quite a bit of those, aren't they? Key of Beginnings, Martial Waking, Looming Darkness, Sleeping Darkness, Strong Initiative, Key of Guidance, Tranquil Darkness, Sorceress Waking, Bottomless Darkness, Almighty Darkness, Black Room, Moment's Reprieve, Bottomless Darkness, Looming Darkness, Stagnant Space, Teeming Darkness, Key of Truth."

"Those Keycards will certainly be helpful," Riku mused.

Namine nodded. "Beats having to find them."

"How did you know…?" Riku began.

"I know just about everything that happened in here," Namine reminded him.

Riku frowned, but didn't say anything.

"Will you need anything else?" 34 asked.

Namine and Riku shook their heads.

"Keep an eye on things though," Riku said. "If there's something you can prevent, please do. And warn us about things if you can."

34 nodded. "Of course, of course. I can't promise you I'll be much help, even with 42 and 27 to help. There's only so much we can do from the Computer Room."

Riku nodded. "Do your best."

"Of course!"

"Good luck," Namine said.

34 beamed. "And you as well, Miss Namine."

She nodded and turned around, heading out of the Computer Room, Riku following right behind.

"What have we just got ourselves into?" Namine wondered.

"Trouble," Riku said. "Loads of it."

Namine raised her eyebrows, but agreed. She walked over to the transport crystal.

"Thirteenth floor, here we come," she muttered.

She and Riku placed their hands on the crystal sphere. They appeared in the entrance hallway to the thirteenth floor. Namine shuddered.

"Are you okay?" Riku asked.

"Fine, I'm fine," she said. "It's just… been a while since I've been up here."

"You don't have to continue," Riku said.

"Of course I do, Riku! We have a job to do."

Riku looked like he wanted to argue, but the look Namine gave him negated all of his arguments instantly. She wasn't going to give up.

"Well then, let's get this over with," Riku said. "The sooner we get rid of this darkness, the sooner we can both be out of here."

"Sounds like a great idea to me," Namine said.

"Map cards?" Riku asked, holding out a hand.

"I can do it," Namine said, pulling the cards out of her bag. "What do we want to start with? Almighty Darkness? Looming Darkness? Sleeping Darkness?"

"Start with that one," Riku said. "If we can, let's avoid Bottomless Darkness."

"Here's a question," Namine said. "Do we want to have rooms with loads and loads of Heartless in order to help expel some of the darkness that we're eventually going to face, or do you not think it matters?"

Riku shrugged. "I honestly have no clue. Castle Oblivion has such a weird state of balance that I have no idea if the Heartless it will create for us will have any impact on the darkness looming at the end of all this."

"Well, given the cards we have, we're going to be fighting a lot of Heartless anyway. And, if the darkness is simply contained in the center quarters, we should be fine. If it's leaked to other places on the floor, I suppose it doesn't really matter what map cards we use, we'll end up with the extra darkness anyway."

"That's comforting," Riku said, rolling his eyes.

"Can you sense any darkness on the other side of this door?"

Riku sniffed. "Doesn't smell any different than Castle Oblivion usually does. But I can feel the nastiness waiting for us on the other side of this floor."

"Me too," Namine said, shivering a tad. "I can thank Kairi for that."

"Your reason for being able to sense the darkness is at least significantly more noble than mine," Riku said.

"Hmm? Oh, because of the whole Princess and Light thing?"

Riku nodded.

"As opposed to…?"

"Being through the Realm of Darkness and back," Riku muttered. "Twice."

"By that logic, Sora would be able to sense it too."

"I doubt Sora was there long enough to pick up the senses," Riku said, brushing the matter off. "I would bet that Aqua can sense it though. She probably just doesn't show it. I try not to."

Namine shrugged. "We should probably get started on this," she said. "And talk as we go. We were just talking about wanting to get this done quickly."

"You were the one who started stalling," Riku said, a grin forming on his face.

"You were the one who let me stall!" Namine retorted, pulling the Sleeping Darkness card out of the stack. She held it up to the door. In a flash of light, the door opened.

"Here's a scene I never imagined I'd see again," Riku said, staring at the clumps of sleeping Heartless. He summoned his blade nearly silently. It appeared in his hands readily.

"I should have told 34 to turn off the separate battlefields," Namine mused. "That would make this go faster."

"Do you think he can hear us and turn them off?" Riku asked.

Namine shrugged. "No idea. I don't think it was 34 who turned them off during our last battle here. I think that was 19…"

Riku grimaced. 19 wasn't around anymore…

"Well, separate battlefields or no," he said. "Let's get this over with."

"Do we have a particular plan?" Namine asked. "You hack and I shatter? Or you hack and I heal? What?"

Riku thought about this for a moment. "Save your energy," he said after a moment. "I don't want you to waste all your energy shattering little Heartless when we get to whatever exactly it is that's waiting for us."

"There's no telling if I can shatter what's at the end," Namine said. "If it doesn't have memories, I can't touch it."

Riku considered this. "Well, save your energy regardless. I like the I hack and you heal. But, shatter when you feel it necessary."

"So, like when you're in over your head," she said.

"Yeah, pretty much," Riku said.


	61. No Time to Think

**Author's Note: **Nice and happy and on schedule! Still haven't written too much more of this sequence. BUT! Done with my midterms! And, I had a wonderful bit of spare time yesterday so I got LOADS ported over to Blogger. Check out Posterous though anyway for chapter commentary and review responses. Also, I posted a link to a picture there. You should check that out.

* * *

><p>"I am perfectly content <em>not <em>to deal with those again."

xx

The battle went quickly, purely because it was all Shadows and Darkballs. Namine shattered a couple of the Shadows purely because if she hadn't, she would have done absolutely nothing in the battle. Riku sliced through everything else with ease.

The next three battles went similarly. All of a sudden, there were no more Heartless in the room. Riku and Namine were hardly fazed. Neither of them had even needed to Cure or use a potion or anything.

"That was easy," Riku said, looking around the small room suspiciously. "Too easy."

Namine shrugged and walked up to the door to the next room.

"Any preferences?" she asked.

Riku shrugged. "Something with Heartless," he said.

Namine snorted and pulled out one of the many Teeming Darkness cards. She put it up to the door and it opened. Namine and Riku had barely walked in the door when they were assaulted by a Mega Shadow.

"Well, I did say I wanted Heartless," Riku said, baring his blade.

Namine smirked and looked around, getting an idea of what this battle was going to look like. Mega Shadows, Gigas Shadows, some Darkballs. Easy enough.

And so it was. So were the next three battles in the room.

"I'm going to say it again," Riku said, running up to a Darkball and attacking it in order to get the upper-hand in the next battle. "This is too easy. The darkness' smell isn't even getting any stronger."

"We've only progressed one room," Namine said.

Riku shrugged, twirling his blade around as he readied himself for attack. "I just want to know why this is so easy."

"Let's just take advantage of it while we can," Namine said.

Riku didn't respond. He launched himself into an attack instead. Namine rolled her eyes and shattered one of the Darkballs that he missed.

Four more battles later and the room was clear. No more Heartless were wandering about, no more even appeared. The room was quiet.

"Why is this so easy?" Riku muttered.

Namine didn't have an answer for him. She walked up to the door.

"Will Almighty Darkness make you feel better?" she asked.

Riku shrugged. "I don't know if I actually _want _this to be hard," he said. "I just don't want it to be this easy. It feels wrong."

"You've gotten stronger since the last time you were here," Namine suggested.

"That can't be it," Riku said. "Or not all of it at least. Can you sense the darkness that we're eventually going to face?"

Namine closed her eyes, searching.

"I can't pick up anything in particular, but I know it's there. There are no memories that I can sense from here."

"Are you too far away?"

Namine shook her head. "I don't think so. I can sense 34 and 42's memories… where's 27… oh! There he is." She opened her eyes. "I never had a problem sensing Sora's memories, regardless of where he was in here. I don't exactly know how large my range is normally, but being in Castle Oblivion, I can sense anyone that's in here if they're not trying to block me."

"Who'd block you?"

"Shad," Namine replied. "Though, there's no way he'd be here. When I was here with Sora and Kairi it was almost as if Larxene tried to block me, but she also went into a dark corridor, and I doubt I could sense them with her in the Betwixt and Between and I'm in Castle Oblivion."

"Ah, right."

"Can you sense anything about the darkness?" she asked.

Riku closed his eyes. His nostrils flared.

"It smells and it's ugly. But that hasn't changed since the first room."

"Well, there's nothing really to do except move on at this point then," Namine said. "Do you want to go for Almighty Darkness or not?"

Riku shook his head. "Can I see the cards?"

"Sure," Namine replied, handing them over.

Riku shuffled through the cards until he selected one seemingly at random. Namine caught a glimpse of the card before he held it up.

"Black Room?" she asked. "What is the purpose of that?"

Riku snickered. "I like attacking the Black Fungi, it's fun."

"You're weird," Namine said.

"Usually Sora's the one that gets that."

"I'd ask how you can like attacking a particular type of Heartless, but Roxas has a thing for Neoshadows, so I don't really have any base for asking."

"Does Roxas have a reason why he likes Neoshadows?" Riku asked.

"It has something to do with Xion and everything else to do with things he doesn't remember," Namine said with a shudder.

"Oh! This goes back to that time on the Memory Skyscraper, doesn't it?"

"Yup," Namine said with a nod.

"Right. Well, anyway, I like attacking Black Fungi. I don't know why, I just do."

The door recognized that there was a card being held up to it and it opened.

Riku snorted. "This door has issues."

Namine laughed too. "Yeah, just a bit. Can I have the cards back?"

"Why?" Riku asked.

"My bag is safer than your pockets."

"What makes your back safer than my pockets?"

"You're fighting a whole lot more than I am."

Riku's nose twitched. "Touche."

He handed her the cards.

"I just don't want to lose any of them," Namine said. "You never know when one will be really important."

"I used to carry around loads of cards," Riku argued.

"Forgive me for being paranoid," Namine replied.

Riku laughed. "You're forgiven. Don't worry about it."

Namine smiled and headed through the door, Riku right behind her.

However, on the other side of the room, they were not faced with Black Fungi, but different Pure Blood Heartless.

"Uh, that's not what I was expecting," Riku said.

Namine bit her lip. "I don't recognize these Heartless, do you?"

Riku shook his head. "Heartless that I have no idea what they do, wonderful."

One of the Heartless seemed to take notice of Riku and Namine. Before either of them had much chance to react, it pooled into the ground like a Neoshadow or a Pooler and travelled to them. It opened up underneath them, transporting them to the battlefield. Riku and Namine were left ever-so-slightly dazed from its opening attack.

Riku shook his head to clear it. "Didn't see that one coming," he muttered.

Several of the pooling Heartless (for that was all that was on the battlefield) had pooled down and were coming for Riku and Namine.

"I don't know what those are," Namine said. "But I have a very simple tactic. Run!"

"Agreed," Riku said.

Namine ran away from the Heartless, Riku dodgerolled.

Unlike the Poolers, these Heartless emitted a dark purple gas when they pooled down. Riku and Namine correctly assumed the gas was poisonous.

"That's rather like the Black Fungi," Riku said. "Except I don't know how to attack these guys."

"When they're not pooled down," Namine suggested.

"Easier said than done," Riku said. He had just tried to swipe at one, but the minute he did, it pooled down, making it impossible to hit.

"Magnet magic," Namine said.

Riku's eyes lit up. "Good idea."

"Magnega!" Riku shouted, pointing at the Heartless.

A large clump of them were pulled into the air, circling around each other. Riku jumped into the fray and attacked them. It was very effective. Riku repeated this process a couple of times. However, the fourth time that he did this, the Heartless started emitting their poisonous gas. Unfortunately for Riku, they did this just as he was in the middle of them all. He became stuck, suspended in midair, in the midst of his own Magnega spell, unable to escape the poison. He coughed.

"Riku!" Namine screamed.

Riku's only response was to cough more. He couldn't get out of the middle of them all.

Namine closed her eyes. She focused on all of the Heartless, being extra careful to weed Riku's memories out of the mixture so that they were unaffected by everything that she was about to do. Once she had locked onto as many of the Heartless' memories as she could, she shattered.

All of the Heartless attached to Riku's Magnega were instantly killed. Riku fell to the ground, still coughing and spluttering. He clutched his head in pain, but he made no indication that it hurt.

Namine wasn't in a position to notice. Her eyes were still tightly clamped shut. She latched onto every other Heartless on the battlefield and shattered them as well. It was time for this battle to be over.

Once all the Heartless were gone, Riku and Namine were naturally transported back to the room.

"There were more Heartless in here, were there not?" Namine asked, looking about. "That's weird…"

Currently, there were no more Heartless in sight. The room was as empty as it was silent.

Riku squinted, still clutching his head. "Quite frankly, I don't care."

Namine's eyes widened, noticing Riku's discomfort for the first time.

"Did I accidentally get at one of your memories?" she asked, her voice catching in her throat.

Riku shrugged, still squinting.

Namine reached up and put her fingers on Riku's temples. Riku almost pulled away, but refrained. The logical part of his brain kicked in and told him that Namine wasn't actually going to intentionally harm him, even if the pained part of his brain didn't want _anything _touching his head.

"No…" Namine murmured, searching through Riku's memories. "I didn't shatter one of yours by mistake. I suppose it's possible that because you were in the middle of all the other Heartless that you got a headache as a side-effect… I accidentally gave Kairi a headache while searching for memories and we were in the same body…"

"When was that?" Riku asked, deciding that talking was an excellent way of getting his mind off his throbbing head.

"Recently, when she and I were at The World that Never Was. I told you about our Combo, did I not?'

Riku nodded. "Yeah, right before you mentioned that you had a whole ton of Nobodies after you."

"Still don't know what to make of that one," Namine mused.

"Neither do I," Riku muttered, rubbing his temples. Namine put her hands back down by her sides.

"I'm really sorry that I gave you a headache," she said, her voice instantly getting several notches quieter.

Riku shrugged it off. "It's no big deal, you got me out of the Heartless-clump. It could easily be the poison that's giving me a headache."

"The poison!" Namine exclaimed. She placed her hand on Riku's shoulder. "Cure!"

Riku's headache dulled and he felt instantly more awake.

"I have a new plan," he said. "No more Black Rooms. Those aren't Black Fungi."

"Black Fungi are Emblem Heartless," Namine said. "I'm honestly not surprised."

"Hmm?"

"Everyone in Hollow Bastion is noticing a decrease in Emblem Heartless in favor of Pure Blood ones. Those ones that we were just fighting were _definitely _Pure Blood."

Riku nodded.

"Well, we should keep moving."

"Are you all right to?" Namine asked.

Riku nodded. "Of course. I'm fine." He turned to her. "I wouldn't be, though, if you weren't there."

Namine blushed.

"There were totally more Heartless in this room before we went into that battle," Riku stated rather suddenly.

Namine forced back a small giggle. "I know! I was just saying how weird it was…"

"Well, whatever. I'm perfectly content _not _to deal with those ever again."

"Agreed!"

The two of them walked over to the door.

"So what should we do next?" Namine asked, pulling out the deck.

"Tranquil Darkness," Riku said, looking at the cards from over her shoulder. "I need a break."

Namine nodded and held up the Tranquil Darkness card to the door.


	62. Dark Impetus

**Author's Note: **Okay, so... big news. Ish. I guess. Big enough to warrant me taking a huge Author's Note to do it instead of defaulting to the blog. (Given the crap that Posterous is known to do, not a bad idea on my part, anyway.) All right, so I'm taking a hiatus in November. I may post a bit at the beginning, but chances are, I'm not going to be writing anything. I have two more scenes I wanna write and then I'm taking a break to rewrite my first novel.

In addition to that, however, I'm actually going to end Betwixt and Between. DON'T PANIC JUST YET. I've got reasons for doing this. I'm ending Betwixt and Between because it's 60+ chapters of completely inconsistent plot. Now that I know where the story's TRYING to go, I'm going to start a new fic fresh and continue where I left off. I mean, sure, I could just continue posting things in Betwixt and Between, but honestly, the idea of a fresh slate sounds really appealing to me. Nothing's actually going to change except you'll have to keep an eye out for the new fic I post. (By that point, I should be COMPLETELY moved over to Blogger, so just keep your eye on that.)

I'm going to finish this sequence in CO, then have two more sequences (spoilers if I mention them), but trust me, the final scene will have an 'ending-like' quality. But, it'll probably be on the par of like... Pirates 2 or Catching Fire, where you TOTALLY know they've set up for the sequel. I just feel confident that this is what's best for this fic. So, hang on with me for the next bit of this journey!

Now that that's all out of the way, the chapter!

* * *

><p>"That would be my luck."<p>

xx

Riku's nostrils flared the second they stepped into the new room.

"What is it?" Namine asked, looking at him, her brows furrowed.

"The darkness," Riku said. "It's gotten stronger. Not by much, but it's stronger…"

"Are you sure that's not the headache talking?" Namine asked.

"How do you know I still have a headache?" Riku asked, giving her a wry smile. "You can't _possibly _be able to know that because you can see memories."

"No. But I can tell by the look on your face. You look as though you're trying to squint through things that are too bright."

Riku shrugged. "Ignoring my headache, I'm pretty sure that's _not _what's going on here. The darkness is just stronger. Can't you feel it?"

Namine closed her eyes and searched. She shook her head.

Riku sighed. "Well, it's stronger."

"I believe you," Namine said.

Riku just nodded.

One of the three Shadows in the room had finally wandered over to where the two of them were standing. Riku, his blade already summoned, chucked it at the Heartless. The blade barely had made impact when they were taken to the battlefield. Riku's blade boomeranged back to him and he caught it, prepped to send it out again.

This battle consisted of half a dozen Shadows.

"Easy," Riku grunted. "Let's just get this over with. I hate fighting with a headache."

He chucked his blade once again, but this time, it had Fire attached to it. Only one Heartless managed to survive the attack. Namine didn't even get a chance to try and shatter it before Riku launched himself at the thing and brought his blade down on its head.

"We could try another Cure," Namine said as they phased back into the room.

"Nah," Riku said. "I can fight through this one."

Namine wasn't so sure if he was right, but she wasn't quite up to arguing with him over a headache. She couldn't be sure how bad it was, but she could guarantee it wasn't _that _bad, otherwise he would be having a harder time fighting. Or he was just really good at hiding his pain. Neither would surprise her.

The next two battles went very quickly. Riku's headache did nothing to impede his fighting. It did, however, make him quite irritable when Heartless didn't die the first time he hit them. Namine let him fight though, because she was becoming more and more convinced that it was actually just a minor headache as a result of the poison, rather than her doing anything to his memories by accident.

If the headache persisted though, she would have to say something.

When it came time to select the next room, Namine chose Martial Waking without really letting Riku argue. He didn't even try.

"The darkness has gotten stronger again," Riku muttered as they walked into the next room.

Namine merely nodded in agreement. She had not particularly noticed, but she believed Riku when he said the darkness had gotten stronger.

There were a moderate amount of Heartless in the room. Riku went through each battle easily, hardly stopping for a breath, or for a Cure. It turned very quickly into Riku fighting and Namine sending up Cures for him. She still watched the Heartless, but not as closely as she did Riku. If the Heartless were to get too bad, she'd be ready for them though.

"How's the headache?" she asked Riku as they walked to the doorway to the next room.

He shrugged. "Surprised it's lasted through this many Cures though."

Namine bit her lip.

"It's nothing you did!" Riku said. "You said so yourself. I bet it was all that poison. It was toxic."

"Maybe a potion?" Namine though.

"Do you have a potion?" Riku asked.

"In my bag, somewhere. Aerith told me to always carry a potion, because you never know when your magic's going to run out." She laughed almost nervously.

"My magic replenishes," Riku said.

"Not everyone is cool like you, Riku," Namine teased. "Besides, there are bound to be instances where your magic doesn't work."

He shrugged.

She fished the potion out of her bag. He took it and pocketed it.

"I promise I'll use it," he told her, noting the confused expression on her face. "But I'll use it when I actually need it, not now, when all I need to do is get rid of a headache."

"Understandable," Namine said.

"What room next?" Riku asked, nodding at the door with his head.

"I hadn't decided yet," Namine said.

"Sorcerous Waking," Riku suggested.

"Why?"

"For fun," he replied with a shrug.

Deciding that Sorcerous Waking was just a good a room as any, Namine selected the card from the deck and held it up. As they crossed the threshold, all Riku could say was:

"Still getting stronger."

But this time, Namine could feel it too.

This room also had a moderate amount of Heartless in it. Riku and Namine split the battles up pretty evenly between the two of them this time. Riku had fun playing with Stop and Gravity magic whereas Namine perfected her Fire and Blizzard magic. There was no need for the potion. Riku did nothing to complain about his headache and Namine almost wondered if it had simply gone away on its own accord. She didn't ask, though.

When the room was clear, Riku headed over to the door.

"No, not that one," Namine said, on a completely different wall than he was on. "This door."

Riku raised an eyebrow. "Namine…"

"I know, I know," she interrupted. "It doesn't look like there's a door here, but trust me, there is. It can only be seen by those who know it's there."

Riku skeptically walked over to her.

"This is actually going to function as a shortcut pretty directly to Marluxia's old quarters, which is where we're going. I don't see the point on wasting our time on a probably unnecessary loop across the width of this floor killing small outbursts of darkness when we can go this way and get to the head of the problem faster."

"No complaints from me," Riku said with a shrug. "I just can't see the door."

Namine almost smirked. "What should we make this room?"

She flipped through the deck for Riku to see.

"Teeming Darkness," Riku said. "I'm up for a bit of a challenge again."

Namine selected the appropriate card and held it up. As the light flashed, Riku's nostrils flared.

"Darkness," Namine stated.

"Oh yes," Riku agreed.

Namine nodded sullenly.

As they stepped into the next room, the amount of Heartless they were presented with was actually quite disgusting—as Kairi would have labeled it.

"Talk about teeming darkness," Riku muttered.

"I bet the stronger darkness is having an effect on them," Namine said.

"No doubt about that," Riku said. "Let's get fighting! Oh, on the off-chance that I decide that clearing this room entirely is a bad idea, which door am I fighting towards?"

Namine pointed to the one entirely on the opposite side of the room, it was also the one that was up on a completely separate level that would involve several ladders at the least.

"You sure it's not that one?" Riku said, gesturing to the door on their right which could easily be gotten to with a few well-placed jumps.

"Positive. That door's the bounty door."

"Anything worth getting?"

"Probably not at this point," Namine said. "There's no telling if what's behind that door hasn't been contaminated by the darkness anyway."

"Right," Riku said. "Onto the fighting then!"

He launched himself to a nearby batch of Heartless, beginning the fight.

The amount of Heartless on the battlefield was egregious. Not only were there just the usual slew of Shadows, Neoshadows and Darkballs, but there was an Invisible as well. Riku wasted no time in launching into them with the strongest attacks he could muster.

"Don't wear yourself out!" Namine cautioned.

Riku merely grunted in response.

Namine decided it would be best to balance her own attacks and Curing herself and Riku. She didn't want to particularly touch the Invisible though, it could very easily prove to be too much for her. She'd never shattered one of them before.

"You're negating the need for the potion," Riku pointed out as she Cured him for the second time.

"I don't fully believe there to be time for you to uncork it and drink it, so just let me take care of the healing for now."

Riku grunted another response.

The battle was long and arduous. Riku and Namine both fought and when Namine found a spare moment, she healed them.

"Don't run your magic dry!" Riku said.

"I won't," Namine replied. "Promise, I won't."

"I don't entirely believe you," Riku said. "Let me handle the Cures for a while."

Namine found it pointless to argue.

At long last, the battle was over. Once Riku and Namine were back into the room, Riku started running straight-on to the door.

"What about clearing the room?" Namine asked. "Or have we abandoned that idea already?"

"We're going to wear ourselves out trying to clear this room," Riku replied. "We need to move out of it and move out of it quickly."

However, as he said this, a Neoshadow swiped out and caught Riku on the leg, transporting them back to a battlefield. This time, there were two Invisibles.

"Granted, it's going to be impossible to make it out of this room _entirely _without a fight," Riku added. "But the sooner we get to the source, the better."

"You aren't getting any arguments form me," Namine said.

Namine felt herself getting tired during this battle. Her magic was growing weaker.

"Riku," she called out, warily.

Riku didn't even need to hear what she was getting at. He dashed over to her and gripped her tight.

"Remember that limit of ours?" he asked.

"Barely," Namine said.

"You can do it!" he urged.

She nodded, closing her eyes and concentrating.

The shockwave that emitted from the pair was definitely damage-dealing. Every single Neoshadow, Darkball and Shadow was killed instantly. The Invisibles even disappeared.

"Just as effective as I had hoped," Riku said smugly as they were transported back to the room.

"Let's get to that door," Namine said, starting off at a run.

"Do you need magic replenishment?" Riku asked.

Namine was already tossing up an ether.

Riku fought back the urge to point out she could have done it on the battlefield. Granted, their Limit did wonders for making that battle go quickly. It was also entirely possible (and most likely feasible) that she just didn't have the ability to reach into her bag and find an ether. Whatever the case, she was fine. Unfortunately, he still had that headache…

But it wasn't bad enough to warrant the potion. He wanted to save that.

To Riku's chagrin, Namine ran straight into a Neoshadow that popped out of nowhere.

Namine shattered the Neoshadow en route to the battlefield, which Riku thought most impressive. However, whether it was because she shattered the Neoshadow or not, the battlefield was filled with six Invisibles, nothing else.

Riku swore internally.

Their opening attack was to each throw a ball of dark energy directly at the two of them. Riku threw up a dark shield to protect the two of them. The shield absorbed the darkness balls, glowing stronger with each one. Riku kept it up, just in case they sent more. They didn't.

One of the Invisible's disappeared. Riku looked back at Namine.

"That wasn't too bad," she murmured. "There's just no way I could shatter more than one at a time."

Riku snorted. "You've shattered dozens and dozens of Heartless at the same time, multiple times."

"And I have promptly passed out afterwards," Namine reminded him. "You're the one who keeps reminding me not to overexert myself. Invisibles have a lot of substance for whatever reason."

Riku dropped the dark shield, just as the Invisibles threw some more dark energy at them.

"Of course, that would be my luck," he said, throwing up the shield again.

"Hmm, I can attack them remotely using magic," Namine said. "My Blizzard's aren't too bad, neither are my Fire's. When we get it down to just two of them, we can switch to hack-and-slash. But keep the shield up until then."

"Deal," Riku said with a nod.


	63. The Dark of Start

**Author's Note: **I don't think I have too terribly much to say... other than enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>"When isn't darkness angry?"<p>

xx

Namine threw a Blizzard at another one of the Invisibles. It retaliated by throwing its sword in the ground and going invisible.

"Run," Riku said. "I'll keep up."

"Run where?" Namine asked, starting to move ever-so-slightly to the left.

"Just remain a moving target," Riku told her. "I will keep the shield up around us."

"Easier said than done when they do that!" Namine exclaimed, pointing at the dark balls of energy that were surrounding them, just waiting to go off like time bombs.

"When I say jump…" Riku said.

Namine had just enough time to cast Fire at another Invisible before Riku had the two of them jump. The explosion of energy below them would have certainly wreaked a lot of damage had they been in the middle of that, even with Riku's shield up.

Two more Invisibles went invisible.

"Oh, I didn't account for this…" Namine said. "I have no idea which ones I've hit already…"

"Your strategy really is the best we've got though," Riku said. "Even if I were to do something big like Dark Aura, there's a high chance that half of them would be invisible while I was at it. Plus, I'd have to not hit you…"

"You don't give yourself enough credit," Namine said, raising an eyebrow. She cast Fire at another one of the Invisibles.

"Jump!" Riku shouted.

They jumped out of the way of one of the ring of fire attacks. Almost immediately though, they had to jump again to avoid another.

"What do you mean I don't give myself enough credit?" Riku asked.

"You've managed not to hit Sora those other times," she pointed out.

"You weren't…" he began. "But you saw, didn't you?"

"Sometimes I paid attention to what Kairi was up to," Namine sulked, casting Blizzard.

Riku blanched for a second and readjusted the shield in an attempt to cover it up. "Oh, so that _wasn't _something that you saw through memories…"

"Saw it there too," Namine said with a shrug.

Riku didn't quite know what to say.

"How do you keep track of them?" Namine asked, arbitrarily casting Fire at another Invisible. They'd been lucky the past few moments to not have to dodge any rings of fire.

"Lock on to them," Riku replied.

"How do you do that?"

Riku shrugged. "I don't know, you just do it. You just focus on the signature of whatever enemy it is and then you just keep tabs on it during the battle until it's dead…"

Namine focused on the nearest Invisible. She cast both Fire and Blizzard at it before it went invisible.

"I had it," she muttered. "Then it went invisible."

Riku shrugged. "Locking-on isn't a foolproof system. Sometimes, when you're too busy focusing on one energy signature, you're missing an enemy right behind you"

Namine snorted.

"You laugh," Riku said.

"Jump!" Namine interrupted him.

They jumped.

"Good call," Riku said.

Namine allowed herself a smile. She prepared a Blizzard.

"Shoot at that one," Riku said, gesturing to one that wasn't particularly close. "It's weaker."

Without questioning, Namine did so. It died.

"How did you…?"

"Scanning," Riku said.

Namine sighed. "Well, since I can't do that, keep telling me which ones to hit."

Riku had them move a little bit over to their right.

"That one," he said.

She threw Fire at it. It didn't die, but it certainly reeled.

"Why didn't you mention this sooner?" Namine asked.

"Just thought of it. That one!"

"Jump!"

They continued on in this manner. Riku would tell Namine which Heartless was the weakest and she would focus on it so long as it didn't go invisible. Riku and Namine maneuvered their way out of nearly every ring of fire. There was one instance where Namine's foot was caught. Riku threw up a Cure before Namine even had a chance to look at it. No mark was left. Finally, only two Invisibles remained.

"Hack and slash?" Riku asked, looking over at Namine.

"Are either of them particularly weak?" Namine asked, looking between the two.

Riku nodded at the one on the left.

"Go for the one on the right," Namine said. "I've got this one."

"You've taken care of four already!" Riku exclaimed. "Your magic has to be…"

Namine threw up an ether. Riku rolled his eyes and dropped the shield. He went after the Invisible on the right. After a couple of seconds of focusing, Namine shattered the other one. Riku managed to get rid of his with a well-placed Dark Firaga.

They teleported back to the room. They hit the ground running for the next door, not even needing to try and strategize what was going to be next. They were going to make it to that door. Namine started climbing the ladder, Riku right behind her. As they climbed, he cringed as a Darkball got unnervingly close. He resisted the urge to swat at it. That would just start another battle that they didn't have time for. Plus, they'd come back at the bottom of the ladder.

Thankfully, the Darkball decided that halfway up the ladder was simply too far to follow them up. Double thankfully, there weren't any Heartless at the top by the door… yet.

"Something easy," Riku said, panting slightly. He was getting tired, not quite beyond what a Cure could fix, but he didn't want to waste his magic since he'd gone through most of the last battle without getting harmed at all.

Namine bit her lip, thinking. "I am pretty sure that this next room is the last room before Marluxia's quarters," she said.

Riku frowned. "How sure?" he asked.

"Almost positive."

"Moment's Reprieve, then," Riku said.

"What if I'm wrong?" Namine asked.

"We'll deal," Riku said. "I don't want to take the chance of _not _having that room be a Moment's Reprieve when you are almost positive that the room after is the heart of where we're going."

Namine decided it would be a bad idea to point out that it was entirely possible that the next room could be just as consumed by darkness as Marluxia's quarters. She swallowed and pulled the cards out of her bag. She selected the last blue card and held it up to the door.

She and Riku stepped through. To Namine's intense relief, the room was indeed a Moment's Reprieve. A wave of relief passed over Riku's face that Namine was pretty sure he wasn't even conscious of. He staggered over to the glowing circle on the floor, standing in it and basking in its healing effects. Namine sighed in relief and walked over to where Riku was as well. She felt her magic replenish and she instantly felt less tired and strained.

"Headache's gone too," Riku murmured, a smile playing on the corners of his lips.

"Did you even use the potion?" Namine asked.

Riku shook his head. "Though, I might hang onto it… just in case. Do you have others?"

Namine nodded.

"How's your ether stock?"

"Two."

Riku frowned, thinking.

"Save those as much as you possibly can," he said. "I'll take care of healing, because that's a big magic drainer. You focus on other stuff."

Namine nodded.

"What's the next room?" Riku asked.

Namine ran over to check the next room. She snorted. "That's going to take most of the rest of our cards," she muttered.

"Yeah, that's Marluxia's quarters all right," Riku said, walking over as well.

His nostrils flared as he got to the door.

"I know," Namine said. "I can smell it too."

"Well," Riku said. "Lay down the cards."

By the time Namine had unlocked the door, they only had two Map Cards left.

"How fortuitous," Riku said.

"Yeah," Namine said, raising an eyebrow. "Just _barely _enough."

"34 knew what he was doing," Riku said. "Shall we go?"

Namine looked back on the quiet, restful room behind them. She turned back to see the glimmering gold doorway to the next room. Was it her imagination? Or were there darkness stains in that glimmering gold?

"There's really no point in staying here…" she said. "Not really. We're just prolonging the inevitable."

Riku smiled. He took her hand in his. She looked up at him and smiled.

"I can think of a couple of reasons to stall," he said, raising an eyebrow. "Just for a bit."

He leaned down and brushed his nose against hers, putting his arms around her. She threw her arms around his neck and closed the distance between their mouths. Riku smiled.

After a moment, when they had broken away, he said:

"Afraid something's going to happen?" he asked.

"Something always happens," Namine said.

"And we've always made it out alive," Riku pointed out.

Namine sighed. "One of us could get hurt. I mean, I'm not the strongest fighter in the slightest… and if something happens to me… there's no telling what rash decision you're going to make while trying to keep me from further harm…"

Riku brushed his hand over her cheek and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.

"If I thought it was going to be a problem that you're not the strongest fighter, I would have come by myself."

"You wouldn't have wanted to come by myself."

"Then I would have gotten Sora or Roxas or Axel or someone else to help me," Riku said, looking her directly in the eye. "But the fact that you're not a strong fighter yet doesn't bother me. You've got to learn somehow. You've probably got it easier than any of the rest of us did. Sora and I had to just figure it out on our own with little to no help. You've got me!"

"What if you get injured?" Namine said. "What do I do?"

Riku fished the star shard out of his pocket and handed it to her.

"I wouldn't leave you!" Namine exclaimed.

"I'm not suggesting that. But I am suggesting that you get both of us out of there. But only _if _you can't Cure me yourself! I don't like running from battles."

"Can we just leave the darkness like that?"

"If you and I can't take it by ourselves, it's best we come back with reinforcements."

"34 and 42 should be able to freeze the map this way so there's only minimal Heartless when we come back…" Namine said, thinking.

"Enough with the contingency plans though," Riku said. "You and I are going to go in there and we are going to wreak havoc on that darkness."

Namine nodded.

Riku grabbed her hand once more. "We can do this," he told her.

She nodded once more and turned to face the door. She took a preparatory breath and started to walk through, Riku by her side.

Namine had been in Marluxia's quarters only a couple of times before. Before, they had been mostly grey, but full of different plants—most of them with thorns. However, after Sora had come through and dealt with Marluxia, no one had tended to the flowers. The Vexen Replicas had certainly seen no purpose in it. The plants had therefore withered and died, leaving scratchy brown twigs behind.

However, even those were steadily being consumed by the darkness. Neither Namine nor Riku had seen a patch of darkness this big. It couldn't even really be considered a patch. It had pretty much consumed the entire room by this point. It stretched to the already high vaulted ceiling. Black at its heart, but with swathes of blue and purple and red. The tendrils leeched out, looking for new things to consume. Certain parts of it looked almost mechanized.

"That's where they've contained it," Riku said.

"Is that going to make it easier or harder for us?" Namine said, trying to take it all in at once.

"Not too sure yet," Riku said. "Probably harder, since it's angry."

"When isn't darkness angry?"

"Fair point."

"Something else, that I want to add…" Namine murmured.

"Yes?"

"There's no way I can shatter it. It's too big."

Riku nodded. "Well, um, let's get to work."

However, they didn't get a chance to have the first attack. The giant ugly darkness seemed to have noticed they were there. One of the tendrils grew out long and fast and smacked itself down. Right in between the two of them, sending them flying different directions.


	64. In a Flesh of Darkness

**Author's Note: **All chapter blogs are now at Blogger! *goes and updates profile for it to have the right blog* Oh good, I'd already updated that. Moving on. All future chapter blogs and EVERYTHING ELSE will be done on that, not on Posterous. I have a Posterous post explaining the same thing, but I figured I'd post it here as well. For those of you who don't know, I answer just about ALL your questions in the chapter blog posts. I try and get the posts up within a week of posting the chapter. Happy fun stuff. Blogger's got a pretty good comment feature and whatnot. Anyway... now that that's over with... another chapter!

* * *

><p>"I'll stay out of your way."<p>

xx

Riku hardly hit the ground before he was on his feet again, he threw about three spells at the giant tendril one after the other. Blizzaga. Thundaga. Graviga. The tendril shrunk down back to its source.

Namine skidded across the ground, wincing as she went. She pulled herself to her feet and ducked as a different tendril went whipping across her head.

"Can you even call this a Heartless?" she called out.

"I don't see any eyes," Riku said.

"'Cause _that's _the biggest indicator," Namine muttered.

It didn't really matter. Whatever it was that they were facing, it was ugly and mostly darkness.

A tendril came out for Riku, he immediately started hacking at it with his Keyblade, unsatisfied with the amount of time magic took. A different tendril came for Namine. Instead of attacking her directly though, it sunk into the ground and started pooling darkness about, trying to suck Namine in. Having no real choice but to use magic, Namine started throwing Blizzards and Fires at it. Heartless came out of the pool of darkness. They were only Shadows. She shattered them without a second thought, keeping her focus on the tendril.

After a bit, both tendrils pulled back to the source. However, there were still some Shadows about.

"Try and see if you can steal any magic orbs from them," Riku said.

Namine cast Fire at the closest Shadow. Sure enough, it dropped a magic orb.

"That's counter-productive," Namine said.

"Is it worth it?" Riku asked.

"It's sustaining," Namine said. "But I only have magic to kill them with."

"I may lend you my Keyblade later," Riku called.

"And then what would you use?"

"Magic!" Riku said, smirking.

The darkness started spitting balls of Dark Firaga out at them. Naturally, the balls of Dark Firaga targeted Riku and Namine directly. Namine got hit in the back and staggered, she recovered quickly though and sent a Fire blast at the source. Riku jumped over one and ducked under the next, trying to make sure they dissipated before they ended up targeting Namine instead. In the process, he was able to get closer to the source of the darkness, but he couldn't seem to see the edges of it. It was just there… He grimaced and sent a Graviga into the center of it. He wasn't sure if it did any good or not though. Graviga was dark magic and could very well be completely nullified by this darkness.

Holy. Holy would be a good idea. Pity only he could manage was a few Pearls here and there, what they needed was…

"Namine!" he called, smacking himself internally for forgetting.

"Yeah?" Namine asked, throwing Blizzard at a tendril she was nearby.

"Holy," Riku said. "You need to throw Holy at the source."

"I only have two ethers!" Namine responded. "Holy takes more than Cure!"

"No more little stuff," Riku said. "I'll take care of that. You need to be throwing light magic at that darkness."

Namine nodded, her jaw set.

"In the meantime, I'll try and kill the Heartless and let you pick up the orbs."

"When there's more Heartless," Namine pointed out.

"I have no doubt that there will be," Riku said.

Namine licked her lips and made her way to the opposite end of the room. She turned around, facing the source of the darkness directly. .

"I can probably get two blasts out before I need to use an ether," Namine said, doing the math in her head. "But I'll need a minute or two to recover in between."

Riku nodded. "I'll cover you, don't worry!"

Namine stared directly at the darkness. She took a deep breath in, focused everything she had for the biggest blast of Holy she had ever done

"Holy," she said, aiming the blast deep into the darkness.

The darkness seemed to scream when the light came in contact with it. The blast of Holy lasted for quite a bit, much to both Riku and Namine's surprise.

The darkness was completely reeling when the blast ended.

"You good?" Riku asked.

Namine felt funny. Or, rather, she didn't feel tired. In fact, she felt as if she had just Cured.

"Did you throw up a Cure?" she asked.

Riku shook his head.

"I feel like you did," Namine said, cocking her head to one side.

The darkness seemed to growl.

"Can you put out another blast of Holy?" Riku asked.

Without even a second thought, Namine did so. The darkness was nearly paralyzed during this blast, though Riku did have to go take care of a tendril that lashed out in reaction to the magic.

Namine swayed a little when the blast ended.

"You alright?" Riku asked.

"Yeah," Namine said, holding out her hand so he wouldn't come rushing to her side unnecessarily. "Just give me a minute to recover."

She crouched down, keeping her balance. She was still poised to run though if she needed. Her hands rested on the ground in prepping to stand back up rather than support.

Unfortunately, two tendrils came after her, correctly identifying her as the source of their pain. Riku wasn't surprised by this in the slightest and launched himself over there to aid Namine. The tendrils began pooling, bringing out Heartless. Riku sliced clean through the tendrils and then started working on the Heartless. Most of them dropped magic orbs, which Riku left for Namine to gather. A few dropped health orbs which Riku didn't see too much of a problem collecting for himself. From the sounds of it, Namine's strength was fine. One or two Heartless dropped munny. Sadly, not as much munny as Riku would have liked. But, he really couldn't afford to be picky.

Namine stood up and gathered the orbs. She stared at the darkness questioningly.

"It still has _that _much health left?" she questioned.

Riku cocked his head, gauging the health of the darkness beast for himself.

"Yes, yes it does," he replied.

"After two rounds of Holy, that is just depressing," Namine said.

Riku didn't quite have an answer for her.

"We've got a long way to go, then," Namine said.

Riku nodded.

More tendrils started coming for the pair of them. Before Riku had a proper chance to attack, Namine cast Holy again. Naturally, the tendrils shrunk back.

After the blast, Namine once again crouched down for a better recovery. However, instead of sending dark tendrils out in retaliation, the source of the darkness decided to use some magic of its own; specifically Dark Thundaga. It cackled and crackled around the room. Riku managed to dodge everyone that came near him. Namine, on the other hand, given her current position, was not so lucky. One hit her directly, sending her slumping to the ground.

Riku knew she was awake because of the screams. He winced in pain for her, for he knew what Dark Thundaga felt like. It was all the electricity of Thundaga mixed with being hit with pure darkness. Dark Thundaga hurt more than Dark Firaga.

He rushed to her side and threw a dark shield around them. The Dark Thundagas that struck it only made the shield stronger and gave Riku more room to focus on Namine, rather than the shield.

"Stop it!" Namine screamed. "It hurts!"

Riku grabbed her hand. Namine stopped shuddering.

"Push the darkness out," Riku said. "I can try and draw some from you, but I'm not actually very good at that. I need you to push it out."

"But the lightning!" Namine whimpered. "Make that stop first!"

"Namine, I can't make the lightning stop. It just has to run its course. I _can _help you with the darkness though."

Namine started to cry. Riku picked her up and held her close to him. He tried to draw whatever darkness he could to him. Namine wasn't helping him in the slightest. He would've been able to tell if she was trying to push the darkness out. But her body had gone rigid with the Thundaga and she didn't seem capable of doing anything else until that had finished with her.

"I _hate _the lightning…" she spat, her voice barely above a whisper. Her body was still rigid, refusing to relax in Riku's hold. "Throw just a ball of darkness at me any day and I'll deal," she continued, her voice working its way into a sneer. "Just _please _don't make me take any lightning." As she uttered the word 'please' her voice diminished back into a whimper again.

It suddenly occurred to Riku that Namine didn't even cast Thunder magic of her own.

"Larxene," he said. "Larxene's tainted you. You can't handle the lightning."

Namine slowly nodded, her body still stiff.

"You fought against Larxene though, not two weeks ago!" Riku figured that if he just kept talking, he might be able to get her mind off the physical pain. "You can't tell me she didn't use any lightning."

"Kairi and Sora took all of the blasts," Namine said. "Not me."

Riku nodded in understanding.

At last, her body started to relax. Riku smiled and helped her sit up on her own. The Dark Thundaga had stopped raining around them. Riku's shield was beginning to fade, no longer receiving ammunition from any direction. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the potion Namine had given him earlier. He handed it to her, trusting it more than he did a Cure at the moment.

Namine didn't have to be told to drink the potion. However, she nursed it, not quite back up at full strength just yet. Sadly, the tendrils were starting to poke back out at them. Riku got up and threw a Protect around Namine.

"Don't move until that wears off," he told her. "You'll be safe. Recover your strength."

Namine smiled a little. "I'll stand back up and give that big ugly thing a blast of Holy in return!"

Riku grinned cockily. Then he ran off to fight back the tendrils.

The Protect did a good job of keeping the tendrils away from Namine. As well as the magic that the tendrils were now throwing out. However, the Protect did nothing for the pool of darkness that formed behind her. The Protect could easily shield her from the attacks coming from above, but was completely ineffective for the darkness pooling below. About the time she realized what was going on, it was too late. The pool of darkness from the tendril behind her had worked its way under the Protect and she was falling in.

"Riku!" she shrieked, trying to struggle against the darkness. It did her no good, though. The pool of darkness had tendrils of its own that were pulling her in. Her struggling almost seemed to make it worse.

"Riku!" she called again, but this time, her voice was muffled.

Riku turned to see what was happening and his eyes widened in shock. He growled in anger and launched himself over to her. But when he got there, Namine wasn't even visible anymore amidst the darkness. Without even thinking, he thrust is hand into the middle of it all, searching for her. He didn't even want to process what would happen if he _didn't _find her. Of course, only one of two things would happen: in his anger, he would destroy every last remaining bit of darkness in this room and then he'd go to find her in the Realm of Darkness; or he'd just dive after her and deal with the darkness in Castle Oblivion some other time. But his brain wasn't processing those options at the moment. The only option it was processing was: _find Namine, now!_

Something caught hold of his hand! He recognized Namine's grasp. He pulled. Light began to erupt from the pool of darkness beneath him. The light was surrounding Namine as she became visible again. The freer she became, the brighter the light grew. Riku felt a surge of power, and it had nothing to do with his own anger or an increase of darkness. In fact, this surge of power seemed to be coming entirely from the light within Namine.

Namine's eyes locked with his.

"My heart is protected," she said. "Can you feel the power?"

Riku nodded.

Namine smiled. "It's like Dark Aura, only with Light!"

Riku's eyes widened as he understood what she was getting at. He knew he had the ability to do exactly as she had suggested. And he was excited by it.

"If I let go of you," he said. "You won't fall back in, will you?"

Namine shook her head. "Look!"

Riku looked down at their feet. The pool of darkness was still there, but the two of them were floating above it. He was beyond questioning.

Namine slid her hand out of his. "I'll stay out of your way."

Riku didn't bother telling her that it wouldn't matter, that there was no possible way he could hit her now. Those words would be irrelevant and a waste of time. He readied his blade, his body surging with power. He remembered the steps for Dark Aura so well. Without even a second thought, he launched into the Light counterpart. The darkness squirmed every time his blade bathed in light made contact.

Meanwhile, Namine, completely unharmed from the darkness' attempt to take her hostage, gathered together the energy that was left inside of her. When Riku had finished all the strikes of his half of this Limit, Namine threw back her arms, releasing her half. A dozen or so pillars of light erupted in the midst of the source of the darkness.

It screamed for the last time and shrunk back into nothingness.


	65. An Invitation to Disney Town

**Author's Note: **This is a TAD shorter than the other ones, but only by a couple hundred words... anywho, nothing much to say really. Drop a review! Say you liked it, what made you laugh, made you cry, made you want to throw your TV out of the window. Check out the blog, that's where all my chapter commentaries go, as well as all answers to any questions that you guys *points to all of you* have asked. Enjoy!

* * *

><p>"Ew is right."<p>

xx

"Yes!" Namine exclaimed. "We did it!"

She slowly lowered down to the ground, the light aura around her fading.

Riku sort of wished that she hadn't said that. He landed on the ground as well and looked around for impending doom. Sure enough, Dusks and Creepers began appearing.

"I wouldn't be too sure of that…" he muttered.

Namine frowned, instantly looking around.

"What is it?" Riku asked.

"Trying to see if I can find out who sent those," Namine said.

"Any luck?"

Namine shook her head.

One of the Dusks came for Namine, she sent a well-aimed Blizzaga at its face.

"I think it's safe to say someone's after us," Riku said, swiping at two Creepers.

"Yeah," Namine replied.

"I say we get out of here," Riku said. "Not like I'm too tired to fight these guys or anything, but I just don't particularly want to stick around."

"Oh, completely understood."

Riku smiled and offered his hand out to Namine. She grabbed it and the two of them began running back through Floor Thirteen. They didn't encounter a single Heartless, despite having left some in a couple of the rooms. They just ran. Hand-in-hand.

xx

After chatting with 27 and 34 for a bit, Namine and Riku left Castle Oblivion. Riku took Namine to Traverse Town in order to finally get her that knife. He figured Traverse Town would have a good selection of weapons without a whole ton of darkness to contend with.

"So, how do you suppose I was able to Scan suddenly during that battle?"

"Your abilities increased," Riku said with a shrug. "You got stronger and as a result, gained another ability. It happens sometimes."

"So suddenly?"

Riku nodded. "Usually, this sort of leveling happens rather gradually and you don't notice it until all of a sudden, you can do something you couldn't do say, a week prior."

"I just think it's interesting that you and I had just been talking about the Scanning ability and literally later that day I gained it."

"That's probably why it seems so sudden."

"I also got a burst of energy, you saw how I practically double-casted Holy!"

Riku nodded. "That happens when you level. Your strength and magic is renewed. Again, sometimes you don't notice it because when it does happen, you're not low on anything in particular. In your case, however, you were both tired and low on magic, so it was really obvious when it replenished."

"Oh, okay then, that makes sense."

Riku laughed. "I hardly notice when it happens to me anymore. It gets like that when it's happened so many times." He snorted. "It's like I'm out of abilities to pick up or something."

"Oh, I seriously doubt that," Namine said.

Riku laughed. "Oh, probably. I only have to look at people like the King or Leon to know that I've got more to learn."

Namine smiled. She put her hand into Riku's, squeezing it, but only lightly, because it was his bandaged hand.

"Do you ever think you'll be able to take these off?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Maybe? This is several injuries in one."

"It doesn't help that it's your dominant hand."

Riku shrugged again. "Maybe I'll have Tifa look at it. Though, if she tells me I can't fight, I'm going to ignore her."

"Like Sora's done any different?"

"When Kairi's not around!"

They both laughed.

They at last made it to the weapons' shop that Riku was looking for.

"This thing must have moved," he muttered. "I swear it was over there before…"

Their conversation continued as they looked (and tested out) different knives for Namine.

"So, what do you think of the Nobodies?" Namine asked, looking at a silver knife that Riku simply shook his head at because it wasn't strong enough.

Riku frowned, more at her question than at the knife. "They're after us, that's for sure. I can only hope they don't come to Destiny Islands."

Namine shuddered and went off looking for a different knife. "That would be horrible," she said.

"Well, it would and it wouldn't," Riku said, handing her a knife that he felt a good match. "Because, they'd either come in such a way that we'd figure out who's sending them and then we'd be able to put a stop to it right then and there, or they'd come in such a way that makes us go hunting for whoever's sending them in an attempt to keep them away from Destiny Islands altogether. We can all just leave for a bit until it's taken care of."

Namine frowned. "The idea still sounds horrible."

She set the knife back down, not liking how it felt.

Riku shrugged. "It is what it is."

xx

After a bit, Namine finally found a knife that she was pleased with and Riku approved of. It was made out of a very strong material according to the shopkeeper. Riku tested it out and agreed with the man. The blade was silver in color. The hilt looked like it was made out of glass or crystal, but definitely was made out of something stronger. It felt good in her hands.

They also bought a sheath for it and several different belts so that Namine could wear it many different ways depending on what the clothes she was wearing would allow. She could wear it around her waist, strapped to part of her leg, or even concealed in her shirt if she needed to.

After that was all done with, the two of them went out for a bite to eat before heading back to Destiny Islands. It was during dinner that the weight of everything they had done earlier that day in Castle Oblivion settled in. They'd had quite the draining task.

"It wouldn't even surprise me if more than one day passed," Riku said. "Castle Oblivion does that to you."

"It hasn't been that long," Namine said. "Trust me."

Riku didn't question.

xx

Riku dropped Namine off at her and Kairi's house before walking back to his own house. No doubt his mother would mention something. Well, not so much as mention as ask how his day went. Today he at least had an exciting story. He'd eradicated a very large ugly smelly chunk of darkness from Castle Oblivion.

When he got home, Xion was lazing on the couch, reading her latest book. His mom was in her room, working on quilt for the colder weather, regardless of the fact that 'colder weather' on Destiny Islands literally only happened for about two months out of the year. To top it all off, colder weather was about half a year away. However, his mother wanted to ensure that Xion had a quilt, too, when it got cold—despite Xion's protests that she didn't get cold like everybody else.

"How was your day?" she asked.

"Good, Namine and I got rid of some darkness in Castle Oblivion."

"Sounds like fun! Are you hungry?"

He shook his head. "We went and got dinner."

"Well, that's good!" she reached over to her side table and picked up a letter, sealed with none other than the King's seal.

"Xion got one too, but I told her not to tell you what it was because I figured you'd like the surprise."

Riku smiled and grabbed the letter. If it was a surprise, it was no doubt good news.

He thanked his mother and went to his room to open the letter. There was something about it being from the King that made him want to open it by himself.

xx

Namine knocked on Kairi's door.

"Yeah?" Kairi called.

Namine walked in. Kairi was working on one of the Wayfinders.

"I got a knife!" she exclaimed, holding the knife out for Kairi to see.

Kairi smiled. "That's awesome!"

Namine nodded. "I have a question."

"Yeah?"

"Do you have the Scan ability?"

Kairi nodded. "Not for long though, I just realized I could do it a few days ago."

Namine nodded as well. "I just got the ability today, when Riku and I dealing with a darkness problem in Castle Oblivion."

"Oh that sounds like fun."

"Loads."

"You and him do anything else?"

"Well, after the darkness escapade—which Cid sent us on, mind you—we went to Traverse Town to buy me my knife and then we went out to dinner. I don't think we were gone long. Were we?"

Kairi shook her head. "It's just now sundown on the day you left. Don't sweat it!"

Namine laughed. "You never know with Castle Oblivion."

Kairi smiled. Then her eyes went wide.

"You got a letter!" she said, grabbing the letter off of her desk and handing it to Namine.

Namine cocked her head to one side, wondering who would write to her.

"Well, all of us did, really," Kairi said, almost apologetically. "I'm assuming your letter's identical to mine, but I thought you might like to read it rather than hear me tell you."

Namine shrugged. "It doesn't matter."

"Just read it then!"

Namine saw the King's seal and smiled. She opened it up.

"It's an invitation!"

"Keep reading!"

.

_Dearest Namine,_

_ You are cordially invited to attend the Million Dreams Festival held in none other than Disney Town itself. You need not bring anything except an attitude ready for fun. Don't worry about the munny, either. As one of the King's personal guests (and friends) your admission, food and activities are all completely covered. _

_ I really must apologize for the short notice of this letter. However, perhaps it is best that it is short notice so that nothing can come and wreck the festivities. The Festival takes place on the 25__th__ day of Summer, Disney Town time._

.

"When's the 25th day of summer at Disney Town?" Namine asked, looking up.

"Three days from now, actually," Kairi said. "Don't worry about not knowing, I had to ask Sora. And he only knew because of Donald and Goofy."

Namine nodded. "That's coming up rather fast."

Kairi nodded. "It says though that it's probably for the best."

Namine nodded and went back to reading.

.

_We all are really looking forward to your attendance. The Million Dreams Festival is not a celebration to miss! Especially given recent winning events._

_ No need to RSVP, you showing up is clue enough. Our magic brooms are fully prepared to account for everyone who may or may not show up._

_ See ya real soon!_

_ Mickey, Minnie and Pluto_

_._

A tear rolled down Namine's cheek. "This is so exciting!" she exclaimed.

"Isn't it!" Kairi said. "Oh goodness, you don't have to cry!"

Namine wiped her eyes on her sleeve. "Nothing like this has happened to me before."

"Well, then it's a first!" Kairi said. "Are you excited?"

"Absolutely!"

"I wonder if we're supposed to dress up…" Kairi mused.

Namine laughed. "I guess maybe if we just wear something nice, but not too nice. I wouldn't want anything to get ruined."

Kairi shrugged. "Most of my wardrobe nowadays seems to be able to accommodate everything from dinner at Sora's house to a horde of Heartless attacking."

Namine frowned. "More Nobodies came after me and Riku today."

Kairi made a face. "That's annoying."

"Tell me about it," Namine said. "Though, we hardly paid them any mind. We mostly just ran."

"_Riku?_ Run? From a battle?"

"In his defense, we had just finished with the biggest patch of darkness I've ever seen! And I've seen things that Ansem's done."

"Ansem?"

"Xehanort's Heartless, the one that possessed Riku."

"Oh, right. Ew."

"Ew is right."


	66. We who were once Nobodies

**Author's Note: **Hey! So I'm a tad late on this one... but not by much. I like the general dynamic of this chapter... so... yeah! Nothing much else to say about it. My book rewrite is going well. I totally just peeled myself away from the rewrite so I could post this. I've got a blog going for that as well. Given the fact that fanfiction is FAILING on the links, you'll probably just have to copy and paste stuff. (For example, the link to my NEW blog still takes you to the OLD blog. Or, at least it does since the last time rar checked it out. Anyway, so just copy and paste. You should be at blogspot, not posterous. My blog for my book is writing for my lives . blogspot .com. (Take out the spaces.) You should check that out too if you're in any way interested. And with all of that out of the way, onto the chapter!

* * *

><p>"Nobodies" and "nothing" are practically the same thing.<p>

xx

Axel and Roxas sat on the Clocktower, eating the usual ice cream. Naturally, Axel's was almost gone and Roxas had barely started. Roxas had convinced Axel to wear something _besides _his cloak, despite Axel's complains of 'not feeling properly epic enough without it'.

Axel licked the last of the sea salt ice cream off of the stick. Then he fidgeted. He'd been fidgeting for a while.

"Seriously?" Roxas asked, looking at him with a raised eyebrow. "You're that anxious to meet her?"

"No," Axel responded. "Scar itches."

"Scars don't itch," Roxas said. "At least, I don't think they do…"

"Well, technically, it's not a scar yet. It's just not bleeding anymore to warrant new bandages. I seem to have forgotten what shirt feels like. Didn't wear one yesterday…"

He lapsed into muttering that seemed to revolve around cloaks not itching. Roxas decided not to ask questions.

More time passed. Axel stopped complaining about his claymore wound, though he didn't stop fidgeting. Roxas finished his ice cream. The sun seemed almost suspended in the sky, stuck at sunset—though the two of them knew very well that it would eventually set. Roxas leaned back against the tower. Axel remained sitting up straight, continuing to look back.

"Where is she?" he muttered.

Roxas sat back up properly. "Did you tell her you'd have company?"

"Of course I did!" Axel said. "If I didn't she'd probably magically see you beforehand and then run and then I'd _really _have a hard time finding her."

Roxas snorted. "No you wouldn't."

Axel shrugged.

More time passed.

"What's that face for?" Axel asked.

Roxas shrugged. "I feel like I should tease you or something, for liking this girl."

"You already have," Axel pointed out. "When I first told you about her."

"I'm not sure if that counts totally," Roxas argued. "I haven't seen the two of you interact at all, which is where I'm really coming from. You never let me and Xion live anything down…"

"That's your basis of comparison?"

Roxas shrugged again. "It's really my only basis of comparison. Sora and Kairi were pretty much a thing before I came into the picture, and as for Riku and Namine… honestly, I was too busy with Xion to care."

Axel laughed.

"Aren't friends supposed to tease each other?" Roxas asked.

Now it was Axel's turn to shrug. "I think it depends on the friendship."

"What does that mean?"

Axel thought about it. "Well, things would get too serious if there wasn't any teasing. But if teasing is the only thing in a friendship, can it honestly be called a friendship?"

"So a little teasing is good?" Roxas asked.

"I guess so," Axel said.

"I think that girls require more teasing though."

"_Please _don't tell me you're teasing Xion more than you tease me!"

"No! That's not what I meant! I just mean that if there's a girl involved, I'm required to tease you more."

Axel glared. Roxas chuckled because he knew he was right.

The sun was actually beginning to really set and Roxas was beginning to wonder if Kuin was going to show up at all. He was just about to tell Axel that maybe she wasn't coming when he heard footsteps from around the corner. He, apparently, was the only one to have heard the footsteps, too, based on Axel's reaction when she showed up. He jumped clear to his feet as if it was an enemy, not a girl.

Roxas was pretty sure that Kuin smirked.

Axel tried to cover up his quick jump to his feet by introducing the two of them.

"Kuin, this is my best friend, Roxas."

He gestured from Kuin to Roxas.

"Roxas, this is… uh… an acquaintance of mine, Kuin."

He scratched the back of his neck and looked down at his shoes.

Roxas couldn't help laughing. He started to get up to properly greet the newcomer, but she stopped him by merely offering out her hand to him where he was sitting.

"Pleasure to meet you!" Roxas offered.

She nodded. "Likewise."

Axel plopped back down next to Roxas, gesturing that Kuin sit down as well. She walked over to the other side of Axel and sat down. Roxas was secretly glad that she'd sat there as opposed to the other side of him—which is where Xion always sat. He wasn't sure what he'd have done had she sat there, but he wouldn't have liked it very much.

"I'm not sure what Axel hopes to gain by this," Kuin mused. "I'm generally a person who likes to keep to myself."

"As much as Axel would like you to think he's a recluse, he's got too many friends now for that to be true."

"I really just have a close-knit group of…"

Roxas rolled his eyes. "Outside of the group on Destiny Islands, you've got Ven, Aqua, Terra, the King and his pals, the group at Hollow Bastion…"

Axel waved a hand to get Roxas to stop. "All right, all right…"

Roxas grinned.

"You look like Sora when you do that," Axel muttered.

Roxas frowned, he never was a fan of people pointing out just how similar he and Sora were, even if they did have completely different hearts and lives now.

"Axel says you're good with a gun," Roxas said, both changing the subject and preventing what was bound to be an awkward silence.

Kuin smiled. "What else did he say about me?" she asked.

Roxas thought about this for a second. "Not much, really. He's practically kept you a secret."

"Oh really?" Kuin seemed intrigued. "Why ever so?"

"I…" Axel began, but Roxas cut him off.

"He's afraid we'd tease him shamelessly.

Kuin got quite the laugh out of this.

"Oh, he did mention that you can form light corridors," Roxas said.

Kuin's laughter stopped almost immediately. Roxas instantly regretted saying anything. Axel was probably wishing he'd kept his mouth shut about that one too. Roxas could only guess by the look on Axel's face. (What he could see of it, anyways… Axel had his hand over his face in shame probably.)

"Sorry," he said, looking down at his lap. "It's just, for a while, that was the only quality we really knew about you. Apparently it's your job to help keep the balance of the World?"

Kuin nodded. "The job description's changing slightly with the advent of so many Keyblade Wielders."

"What's changed?"

"Well, theoretically, things should get easier," Kuin mused. "However, there's also been several outbursts of darkness."

"Xehanort," Roxas said.

Kuin visibly shuddered at the name. "Oh yes, definitely _him_."

Roxas correctly assumed that it would be a bad idea to press the Xehanort matter any further and didn't ask more questions.

"You're welcome to come to any of our planning sessions!" he offered.

"We have planning sessions?" Axel asked.

Roxas shrugged. "Sometimes."

"Hardly ever," Axel corrected.

"Well, she's welcome to be in on the loop of what we're doing—since we're dealing with the same darkness that she is." He looked at Kuin. "I'm not sure how much Axel tells you."

She smirked. "Generally speaking, I'm not too big of a planner. My glider just takes me to where I most need to be and I handle the problems presented to me."

"Like missions," Roxas said.

"Yes," Axel agreed. "Like missions."

"Is that what daily life was like in the Organization?" Kuin asked. "Missions?"

"Pretty much," Roxas said. "I think we had, one day off, the entire time I was there? I mean, there were special assignments too, but most of it was just missions: go kill that Heartless and collect the Hearts, go do recon on this world to see if it's any use to us…"

"He's much more forthcoming about information than you," Kuin said, looking very pointedly at Axel.

"He doesn't think his life is on the line if he tells you too much about his past," Axel argued. "Even if he did think that, it's not like he's actually done anything to warrant you killing him…"

"What?" Roxas asked, completely confused.

"She's sworn to kill anyone who…"

"Let it _go_, Axel," Kuin interrupted. "If I thought, for any reason, that either of you were targets, I wouldn't be sitting here right now."

"Should I be worried?" Roxas asked, still a little confused.

"Yes," Axel said.

"No," Kuin said, drawing the word out so that it lasted longer than Axel's answer.

Axel rolled his eyes. "Funnily enough, Roxas here is probably the most talkative out of all of us," he said.

"How is that funny?" Roxas asked.

"Because of your history of being a zombie," Axel said.

"I'd like to think that I haven't been too much of a zombie since having my own heart," Roxas argued.

Axel conceded that Roxas' point was true.

"What do you mean by zombie?" Kuin asked.

Axel then launched into a story-like-explanation of Roxas' first few weeks in the Organization. This then prompted more questions about the Organization. However, questions or answers that led to discussions about Xemnas quickly had to be steered away from.

They continued to talk for a while. To Axel's delight, Kuin and Roxas got along quite nicely. He guessed he'd have to introduce her to Xion next. He'd never live it down if it wasn't Xion. Roxas was surprisingly good at keeping the conversation going. Kuin didn't seem to have any qualms about answering any of his questions, or commenting on his stories. Axel laughed internally. There was something about Roxas—probably his connection to Sora—that made everyone simply trust him and not have too many other cares at the moment.

The sky was almost all the way dark when Kuin stood up to leave. Axel didn't ask where she was going and was glad that Roxas didn't ask either. That was just something on the list of things that Kuin didn't do: tell you where she was going next. Roxas and Axel bade her farewell. In a flash of light, she was gone.

Roxas was intrigued about her glider that formed the now legendary light corridors and asked Axel everything he possibly could about them. Axel answered the questions as best as he could, but he couldn't deny forever that he hardly knew any more than Roxas did. Roxas swore he'd have to ask Kuin the next time he saw her. Axel had to come to terms with the fact that such a thing would happen: Kuin would be seeing his friends again. One step at a time though, one step at a time. He had to introduce her to Xion next, then he'd figure out the next step.

"That worked out, rather nicely," Axel said, sounding relieved. Roxas couldn't tell the look on his face because it was too dark to make out anything but silhouettes of everything.

"Yes, it did," he agreed.

"I suppose we should head back," Axel said. "Before it gets so dark that we fall off this Clocktower."

Roxas snorted. "Oh, I doubt _that'll _happen. We've spent so much time up here I bet we could walk on it blindfolded!"

Axel laughed. "You're probably right, friend."

He pulled out the star shard. "Ready?"

Roxas put his hand on the star shard as well. In no time, they were back on Destiny Islands.

"You wanna know something that I thought about during that?" Axel asked.

"What?"

"We didn't get interrupted by anything. No Heartless, no Nobodies, no nothing!"

Roxas decided not to point out that 'Nobodies' and 'nothing' were practically the same thing.

"Do you think there's anything special about that?" he asked instead.

Axel shrugged. "Maybe. Probably. More than likely. Do I know what it means in the slightest? Nope. No clue."

"All right then," Roxas said.

And with that, the two of them began heading back to their respective homes. It was rather late, but neither was worried about anyone saying anything. Roxas had told everyone that he'd be out for most of the evening and probably into the night. Sora's family left their backdoor unlocked so it didn't really matter anyway if he came in after everyone was asleep. And, as for Axel, no one actually kept tabs on where he was at any given time and there wasn't any deadline he had to keep. Except his own of course: his deadline to his bed.


	67. Making Ice Cream

**Author's Note: **So... new cover! Woo! That's exciting, no? Other than that... Million Dreams Festival! That is all. Read up and enjoy!

* * *

><p>"You're always hungry."<p>

xx

"So many things to do!" Kairi exclaimed, looking at the brochure for the Million Dreams Festival. "Where to even start?"

The other five crowded around her to get a better look at the days' events.

"What's that about creating your own ice cream flavor?" Namine asked. She was hardly even looking at the brochure, so it was highly likely that she had just seen those words in Kairi's mind and had not read them at all.

"That looks interesting let's do that!" Sora said, hardly taking a break between his words.

"Hey, I think Xion and I are going to go check out the Rumble Racing," Roxas said.

"Nothing against ice cream," Xion said. "But…" She shrugged.

"You get ice cream all the time," Riku said. "I get it."

Roxas and Xion nodded.

"Have fun at the Rumble Racing thing then," Sora said. "We'll catch you later?"

"Of course!" Roxas said.

With that, the two of them took off.

"Anyone else want to do anything different?" Sora asked. "Not that I'm trying to get rid of anyone, I just don't want to be the only one deciding things…"

"I kind of want to do everything," Kairi said. "So ice cream's just a good a start as anything. Besides, I really want to create my own flavor."

"I think ice cream's fine," Namine said, looking at Riku.

Riku shrugged. "Ice cream's good."

Sora grinned, practically from ear-to-ear. "Sweet!"

Riku laughed at Sora's unintentional pun, and it took Sora a minute to get it, but when he did, he laughed as well.

The four of them headed off in the direction of the giant ice cream stand.

Surprisingly, they didn't get distracted too much on their way. Except…

"Goofy!" Sora exclaimed, taking off in a slightly different angle than they had previously been going. No one else in the group was particularly surprised by this and just followed Sora. He had every right to say hello to Goofy.

However, when the person Sora was shouting at turned around, it wasn't Goofy. He was ever-so-slightly shorter, and had a smaller, younger face.

"Oh, you must be looking for my dad," he said, putting his hand on his neck and scratching slightly awkwardly. He smiled, though.

"Max?" Sora asked.

"Ah-huh!" Max affirmed. "Wait, do I know you?"

"Goo—I mean, your dad mentioned you sometimes," Sora said, looking just as awkward as Max had mere seconds earlier. "He always said he was proud of you, though. And that he was worried about your safety."

Max flushed red. "You're Sora, aren't you?"

Sora nodded. "Uh-huh! And these are my friends, Kairi, Riku, and Namine!"

The other three waved.

"Pleased to meet you, of course," Max said. "Were you looking for my dad?"

Sora shook his head. "I figure I'll run into him _sometime _today. Sorry to confuse you."

Max shook his head. "People do it all the time. It used to really bother me, but I've gotten over it."

"Is that a skateboard?" Sora asked, pointing at the object under Max's arm.

Max grinned and nodded.

"Can I have a go?"

"Sora," Riku snorted. "You'll hurt yourself."

Sora frowned. "No I won't. I'm actually quite good on a skateboard."

"Since when?"

Sora frowned more, thinking. "I can't place exactly when. I'm just good with a skateboard!"

Max laughed. "I'd have to say no, anyway. I've already been yelled at by Donald twice and Horace once about it. Apparently, I'm not supposed to skateboard here."

"Donald!" Sora exclaimed. "I have to say hi to him too!"

"If I see him, or my dad, I'll send them your way," Max said, laughing. "Where you guys headed, anyway?"

"The ice cream place," Namine replied.

"Oh, that place is great!" Max said. "Have fun!"

"We will!" Sora said. "It was nice meeting you!"

"Nice meeting you as well!" Max replied.

They all waved their goodbyes and parted ways.

"Meet someone new every day," Sora said. "Love that."

They at last reached the ice cream stand. The four of them eagerly looked for the part where they could create their own ice cream flavors.

"Oh that's depressing," Kairi said, finding the information on one of the signs. "Not just anyone can create their own flavor. Only the winners of the drawing."

"Well then, two questions," Sora said. "One, how do you get entered into the drawing; and two, how many winners are there?"

"Everyone who buys a scoop of ice cream gets entered into the contest," Namine said, continuing to read the sign. "Three winners are chosen at the end of the day."

"That sounds fair," Kairi said, walking up to the counter. "I'll buy a scoop for a chance for this. It's not like I hadn't planned on spending munny anyway."

"What flavor can I get ye, lass?" asked the duck running the stand.

It was Scrooge McDuck.

"Chocolate raspberry," Kairi replied.

"She would," Riku mused.

"Are all of ye young'ns buying ice cream?" Scrooge asked as he scooped up Kairi's ice cream into a fairly large bowl.

The other three nodded.

"What can I get ye?"

"Mint brownie, please!" Namine said.

"Peanut brittle," Riku said.

"So many flavors!" Sora exclaimed.

Kairi laughed. "Pick one!"

Sora scanned the menu.

"S'mores!" he said after a bit.

"Good choice," Scrooge said, now handing Namine her ice cream.

"Thanks!" Sora grinned.

Scrooge McDuck smiled as well.

As soon as the four of them had paid for their scoops and had filled out the slips for the drawing, they made their way down to other attractions, eating their ice cream as they went. Kairi was intrigued by Fruitball, but she couldn't be convinced to enter to compete, despite there still being plenty of time to do so. She wasn't confident enough in her hand-eye coordination to win. Sora told her that her hand-eye coordination was just fine and Riku told her that she didn't have to win, but she just wanted to watch for a bit before they moved on.

They did get involved in a game of horseshoes; Out of nowhere, Namine won. They all cheered very excitedly for her. Then Sora and Riku entered a noodle-eating contest. Riku called foul when Sora won, but Sora still got his prize (a month's supply of noodles.) Sora decided that he'd probably end up saving them for an adventure that required him to be away from home for a long time.

It was about then that they found the skate rink. People were flying all over the place with skateboards, roller skates and scooters. Everyone there was on wheels.

"Look!" Kairi exclaimed. "It's Max!'

Sure enough, there was Max, skating up and down a half-pipe, being cheered on by a large group of what the four of them assumed to be his friends.

"Go, Max!" Namine cheered, adding to the noise.

"Ooh, I really want to skateboard," Sora said, bouncing up and down.

"Well, maybe now you can borrow Max's skateboard," Riku said. "As soon as he's done."

"Just don't hurt yourself," Kairi cautioned.

"I'm telling you, I'm quite good on a skateboard!" Sora insisted.

"That's my boy!" came a very distinctive voice over the crowd.

"_That's _Goofy!" Sora exclaimed, standing on his toes to find his friend in the throng of people.

Riku, given his height, was able to spot Goofy first. He waved his hand and called out to him. Goofy grinned and walked over to the group.

"Sora! Riku!" he exclaimed. "So good to see ya! And Kairi and Namine too!" He laughed. "How've ya been?"

"Pretty good," Sora replied. "It's kind of been quiet."

"Minus that darkness in Castle Oblivion," Riku pointed out.

Namine made a face.

"How have you been?" Kairi asked.

"All right," Goofy said. "Like ya said, it's been quiet. The King's been working a lot though, plannin' this and everythin'."

"Hey, Dad!" Max said, walking over.

"Maxie!" Goofy exclaimed, grinning.

"Oh! I see Sora's found you, great!"

"Ah-hyuk!"

"In that case, then," Max said. "No offense, but I'm going to go see Roxanne and PJ."

"Go have fun, Maxie!" Goofy encouraged.

"Hey, Max," Sora asked before he could walk away. "Could I have a quick go on your skateboard, now?"

Max laughed and handed Sora the skateboard. "Sure thing! I knew there was a reason to bring it!"

Sora grinned.

"Don't hurt yourself!" Kairi warned.

Sora rolled his eyes. "I'll be fine."

"I'll stick around and cheer you on," Max said.

"Me too!" Goofy added.

"Like I'm going to miss this," Riku said.

Sora grinned and ran off to the rink.

He surprised everyone when he actually knew what he was doing.

"Well, I'll be!" Goofy exclaimed.

"He's got skill," Max observed.

Riku raised his eyebrows.

Kairi had bitten off two entire nails before Namine smacked her arm. "Stop chewing your nails!" she hissed.

Kairi made an exasperated noise.

"Stop worrying so much," Namine said. "You know that Sora goes off fighting enemies more dangerous than this!"

Kairi still made an exasperated whine.

"That's a pretty cool trick," Riku mused.

"Nice Heelflip," Max said.

"So that's what it's called," Riku said.

"Yeah, and that one he's doing right now is called an Air Walk."

"I really must wonder when he had time to learn all this," Namine said.

To Kairi's intense horror, Sora came crashing down onto the ground next to the half-pipe.

"Sorry kid," yelled the judge. "You're disqualified."

Sora made a disappointed face and started to get up. He was about to wipe blood from his chin when it disappeared. The unmistakable Cure flower hung above his head.

Sora looked around and caught Donald amidst the crowd.

"Donald!" he called. "That wasn't really necessary!"

Donald shrugged. "Habit."

Sora and Donald both made their separate ways to the rest of the group and arrived at much the same time. Sora handed the skateboard back to Max.

"Skateboard's still all right," he said.

"You were doing pretty good there up until you came out of that spin wrong," Max pointed out.

Sora shrugged. "I had fun."

"You okay?" Kairi asked.

"Of course I am! Even without Donald's Cure, I'd be fine."

Kairi just bewilderedly put her arms around him. He wasn't entirely sure what this was for, but reciprocated the hug.

"Who's hungry?" Goofy asked. "I've got a hankerin for some chicken!"

"I'm hungry!" Sora blurted out.

"You're always hungry," Donald muttered.

"I could eat," Namine said.

"Lunch on me!" Goofy announced.

This got everyone (including Max and a couple of his friends) to join in. Goofy led them to the supposed best chicken stand in the whole Festival and bought them all a basket of chicken and chips.


	68. Fresh Fruit Balls

**Author's Note: **So I always think of fifty thousand things to say at the beginning of these things. And then I go to post these and I have completely forgotten everything that I was going to say. *sigh* My life. Well, since I CAN'T remember anything to say, I'll just say go ahead and check out my blog for chapter commentaries, review responses, etc. Check out my OTHER blog for random snippets of information about my rewriting of my novel (if you want to.) Other than that, go ahead and check out this chapter!

* * *

><p>"Watching all of you play made me hungry!"<p>

xx

Roxas and Xion parted from the others cheerfully enough.

"You don't think we offended them or anything?" Xion asked.

"Nah, I don't think so. Riku seemed rather understanding on why we didn't want to go get ice cream."

Xion nodded. "I just wouldn't want…"

Roxas rolled his eyes. "Maybe this is just because I know Sora so well, but I can honestly tell you that none of them really care. They're just all here to have a good time and they'll be even happier to know that we had a good time as well."

Xion nodded. "Right, so, Rumble Racing!"

Roxas grinned. "Rumble Racing!"

The track was not hard to find in the slightest. It was arguably one of the loudest attractions at the whole festival.

"I think it would be so cool to race," Xion said, leaning up against the barricade.

Roxas walked up behind her and slid his arm around her waist. "You don't have one of those car thingys though."

"Way to be Mr. Obvious!" Xion said, a disapproving look on her face.

Roxas merely shrugged.

"Pity I can't turn my Keyblade into a glider like Terra, Aqua and Ven do," Xion mused.

"I don't even think that would work if you could," Roxas said, looking at all the cars whizzing past. "All those vehicles seem to have wheels."

"You are just killing all of my joy right now," Xion said.

"What does that even mean?" Roxas asked.

Xion paused, thinking. "Axel hasn't called you a killjoy before?"

Roxas shook his head.

Xion raised her eyebrows. "For all the other insults he jokingly sends our way I thought for _sure _that'd be one. 'Killing joy' means that you're taking all the fun out of everything, basically."

"You could have just said that in the first place," Roxas said. "Where did you even pick up a phrase like that to begin with?"

"Read it," Xion responded.

Roxas should have known. Xion only slept every other night or so, spending the rest of them up reading.

"Why did you say Axel would call me a kill joy?" he asked.

"It goes along with zombie, I would think."  
>Roxas rolled his eyes.<p>

Xion leaned over and rested her head against his chest. "I don't _really _think you're a killjoy. Not all the time, just right now because you're not letting me have wild ideas about getting into this race!"

"How about I help you build a car for the next one of these festivals?" Roxas suggested. "They hold one every year, don't they?"

Xion looked up at him, her eyes wide. "Would you?"

Roxas grinned. "Of course! We can build two, then we both can race!"

"Oh, I would love that!" Xion said. "It's never really occurred to me that we could always come to this again next year. The King will invite us, won't he?"

"Oh, I'm sure he would!"

She grinned. "I'm beginning to really like this life!"

Roxas bent down just a tad to kiss her on the forehead. "Just beginning to?"

She scrunched up her nose at him. "Oh shut up."

He smiled.

They watched Rumble Racing a bit more before heading off to see other things. They bought something known as cotton candy that neither of them had ever seen before. Xion didn't like how it got her hands all sticky after she put it into her mouth. Roxas wasn't sure if he liked the purple color they'd bought to share between the two of them and wondered if he would have liked blue or pink better. But, Xion had insisted on the purple, so he wasn't going to say anything.

They stopped at a little refreshment area to wash the stickiness off of their hands and found themselves at none other than the ice cream stand the others had been talking about earlier. However, the others were nowhere in sight.

"I think this is a sign," Xion said.

"A sign of what?" Roxas asked.

"A sign that we were meant to get ice cream after all," she said, giggling slightly.

"I wonder if they have sea salt!" Roxas said. "Destiny Islands doesn't…"

"They should," Xion said.

Roxas shrugged. "Who am I to control their ice cream types? Besides, it just gives us another excuse to go sit on the Clocktower and watch the sunset."

Xion smiled. "Yeah…"

"Shall we go see if they have sea salt here?"

"Yes!"

The two of them linked arms and walked into the stand.

"Ye've changed clothes!" said the duck behind the counter, looking right at Roxas. "And ye've got yeself a lass!"

Roxas and Xion stared at the duck for a moment before it clicked for Roxas. This wasn't the first time this had happened, and it probably wasn't going to be the last. He wondered if Ven had ever had the same problem.

"Oh, Ven must have been here earlier," he said.

"Ven?" the old duck asked. "Lad who looked jus' the same as ye, with a lass with blue hair and another lad with nearly golden eyes?"

Roxas nodded. "Sounds like them."

"Are ye his twin or something?"

Roxas shrugged and scratched the back of his neck with the hand that wasn't holding Xion's.

"Something like that, yeah," he said.

"Well," said the duck. "No matter. I'll sell ye ice cream no matter what! Every scoop gets an entry to win a chance to create a flavor all to yeself!"

"Do you have sea salt ice cream?" Xion asked.

The duck shook his head. "Sea salt," he mused. "Maybe that's the flavor I've been lookin' for! Can you describe it for me?"

"It's salty," Roxas began. "Then sweet."

"It's light blue in color," Xion added. "And we usually get it on wooden sticks. Twilight Town sells them."

She instantly clapped a hand over her mouth. Not everyone around here knew of other worlds. The King had warned them of that especially.

The old duck winked. "Don't ye worry, lass. I've done me a fair bit of travelin'."

Relief rolled off of Xion in waves.

"Twilight Town, ye say? I shall have to visit there meself! In the meantime though, what can I get ye?"

Roxas and Xion took a moment to look over the menu before Roxas ordered peanut-butter-and-chocolate and Xion ordered cherries jubilee. (She'd read of the dessert in a book somewhere and wanted to see if it was any good as an ice cream flavor. Turns out, it was.)

The two of them walked around the Festival, sharing the two ice creams between them. Roxas, however, was not very fond of cherries jubilee, so he didn't want too much of Xion's. Xion then felt guilty that she was eating Roxas' and he wasn't eating hers, so she stopped asking for more bites.

They wandered around until they finished their ice cream, not wanting to try and do something else in addition to eat. By the time they'd finished eating, they were just outside the Fruitball arena.

Xion stopped, intrigued by the game. Naturally, Roxas stopped as well.

"I kind of want to play this," Xion said. "But I'm not entirely sure how."

"Well, if we stand and watch for a bit, maybe we'll pick up how the game is played."

Xion nodded and stared at the players. Two chipmunks were on one side of the line. Roxas knew them to be Chip and Dale and told this to Xion. However, their opponent was a broom with hands. Roxas and Xion watched the game with interest.

When the match was over, Xion looked up at Roxas, still slightly confused.

"Well, I know they're throwing giant fruit back and forth at each other, but I have no idea how the scoring works or anything."

"I'm still confused too," he replied. "But I'm game to stand and watch another match or two. I know you really want to play."

Xion smiled and turned back to the arena. Roxas smiled too and put his arm around her. She leaned into him, but her eyes were trained on the line and the opponents on either side.

This time, the two contestants were a goat that Roxas did not recognize and none other than Aqua. The first thing that Roxas and Xion noted was that Aqua used her Keyblade to hit the fruit.

"Oh I can _definitely _do that!" Xion said. "I hardly even cared how it's scored anymore. If she's allowed to hit the fruit with her Keyblade!"

She was practically bouncing up and down with glee on this. Roxas was smiling largely as well, getting excited too. He was beginning to think that he was going to play as well.

They watched this match with increasing interest and as soon as it was over (Aqua won) they began to look around to see where to enter. Aqua had apparently noticed them and walked over.

"Here's two familiar faces!" she exclaimed.

Roxas and Xion nodded.

"Where do you sign up for Fruitball?" Xion blurted out.

Aqua smiled. "Right over there," she said, pointing to the cat running the attraction. "You two going to use your Keyblades?"

"Of course!" Xion exclaimed. "This looks like it'll be _so _much fun!"

Aqua laughed. "It is fun!"

Roxas and Xion grinned and ran off to sign up. Aqua went over to where Ven and Terra had been standing while they watched her match and the three of them figured they'd stay to watch Roxas and Xion as well. Roxas and Xion only had to wait for one other match before them. This time, the competitors were a rabbit and a girl with red hair (who just so happened to be one of Max's friends.)

As soon as that match was over, Roxas and Xion were up.

"Only one of us is going to win this," Roxas mentioned, summoning his Keyblade.

"I know," Xion said, taking her place on the other side of the line, summoning her Keyblade as well. "Promise you won't have hurt feelings if I beat you?"

"Only if you promise not to have hurt feelings either!"

She grinned. "Of course."

Fruit dropped from above and Xion and Roxas started hacking away. It became pretty apparent then what the whole goal of this was. There were flying goals behind the each of them that they had to protect. The objective was to knock the giant fruitballs into the other's goal. In theory, really simple. However, if a fruit wasn't hit correctly, it could lead to complications.

Bananas, for example, would just fall dormant on the ground and make it really easy to trip on them. If they completely missed a watermelon or a pineapple and were hit by it, they were stunned for several seconds. The apples didn't have any complications to them, but they were just a pain to hit for some reason. The grapes at least, even if they broke into smaller pieces, could be used as multiple ways to get a goal. Roxas was only able to take advantage of this once.

Even with him managing to score seven points with one grape fruitball, Xion still won. But only by one point. When the buzzer sounded to signify the end of the game, the two of them walked straight up to the center line and shook hands.

"Good game," Xion said.

"You too!" Roxas replied.

They banished their Keyblades and walked over in the direction of Aqua, Terra and Ven.

"What should we do next?" Roxas asked, reaching out and grabbing Xion's hand.

"I don't know, whatever you want to do," Xion replied.

"Something with you!" was Roxas' response.

"Pretty stellar game, guys!" Ven exclaimed.

"Thanks," Xion said. Roxas nodded.

"Where are you guys heading?" Terra asked.

"We don't know yet," Roxas replied.

"We were just going to grab a bite to eat. They apparently have pretty good chicken," Ven said.

"Sure," Xion said. "We'll come along."

She looked up at Roxas for confirmation.

"Yeah, I could definitely eat after that game!"

"I know, right?" Ven exclaimed.

"You didn't even play!" Aqua argued.

"Yeah, but watching all of you play made me hungry!"

Aqua and Terra both laughed at this. Roxas and Xion weren't entirely sure why this was funny. Roxas thought it might be something like how Riku would laugh every time Sora said he was hungry. Or something like that.

And so, the five of them went off to get chicken.


	69. Go! Go! Rumble Racer

**Author's Note: **Yeah, okay, I pretty much JUST posted a blog apologizing for delays and now I'm posting a chapter not too long after. Oh well lol. Anywho, another chapter from the Million Dreams Festival, and I know this chapter should make a lot of you happy. My only real comment is for you guys to be checking out the blog for answers to your questions and stuff! It's cool to comment too! I like getting comments! (Like I like getting reviews!) (Not that I'm saying you HAVE to review, but I do like feedback, and to feel like I'm not just writing at you. I like the friendship-like-substances that I get with my regular reviewers!)

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><p>"How do you plan on entering a noodle-eating contest?"<p>

xx

The first thing Aqua, Terra and Ven did when they arrived at the Festival was get ice cream. As they did, they talked about what things had been like the last time they had been here—years and years ago. Then they began figuring out their favorite events. Terra and Ven were going to do Rumble Racing. Aqua wanted to play some Fruitball. And like that, their day was falling together.

They left the ice cream stand each with a different flavor. Terra had Rocky Road. Ven had Caramel Nut Crunch, and Aqua had Strawberry Banana. They ate their ice cream as they walked to Rumble Racing, figuring they'd start there and then head to Fruitball. They'd probably end up getting food after that (real food, not ice cream) and then they'd go visit some of the other attractions.

They stood watching some of the early races for Rumble Racing as they finished their ice cream.

"Ah!" Ven exclaimed. "Brain freeze!"

"I hear if you stick your thumb to the roof of your mouth it'll go away," Terra said.

Ven almost did that when he realized what Terra was trying to pull.

"Very funny," he said. He shook his head and went back to eating his ice cream—slowly. Terra chuckled.

Ven was the last to finish his ice cream and as soon as he had, he and Terra went up to get their cars. As soon as they knew they were coming to the Million Dreams Festival, Terra ensured that they'd have vehicles for Rumble Racing because he and Ven wanted to participate so badly. Aqua had not previously signed up for this event, but she was perfectly content to stand against the barriers and cheer for Terra and Ven every time they came around the track. Neither of them won, but they didn't particularly care. Terra just wanted to race a good race and Ven was only there to have fun.

"Now where?" Ven asked.

"I think we had agreed on Fruitball," Terra replied.

"You guys got to do your Rumble Racing," Aqua said. "Now it's my turn for my game."

"Seems fair," Ven said. "I just wasn't sure if we were going to do anything in between, that's all."

"We'd already figured Fruitball after Rumble Racing," Terra said. "Where were you?"

Ven frowned. "Too busy having brain freeze," he replied.

This got a laugh out of the other two.

Aqua went right up to the cat running Fruitball and signed herself up.

"Do either of you want to play?" Aqua asked Terra and Ven.

The cat's pen was poised on the paper.

Both Ven and Terra shook their heads.

"Suit yourselves," Aqua said. "Just me then."

"Very well," replied the cat. "You've got two matches ahead of you. Your opponent is Gilda."

"That sounds lovely," Aqua said.

She, Ven, and Terra all went into the crowd around the Fruitball area to watch the matches preceding hers. The first one of the two was one that they didn't pay much attention to, considering they knew absolutely nothing of the opponents. But, they cheered especially loud as Chip and Dale won the second match. Aqua couldn't help but be proud of the broom that competed against them though. Ven wondered how it was able to play without eyes and Terra scolded him that the broom obviously knew what it was doing since it only lost to the team of Chip and Dale by a few points.

And then it was Aqua's turn. She walked up and took her place on her side of the court. She summoned her Keyblade and prepared for the fruit barrage. It had been a long time since she had played Fruitball, but she was pretty sure she remembered how to do it. Sure enough, after ten or twenty seconds, she had worked herself into a groove up against Gilda. Though, she did have to admire Gilda's athleticism.

Ven was distracted from watching Aqua by noticing his doppelganger. Roxas and Xion stood off to the edge of the crowd, very intently watching the match. He tugged on Terra's sleeve and pointed to the pair.

"Should we go over there and say hi?" he asked.

Terra, noticing Roxas' arm around Xion, shook his head.

"They look like they're having a moment," he said.

"They look like they're watching the match," Ven argued.

"Which is what we should be doing to support Aqua," Terra said. "We can go over and say hi after her match."

Ven conceded that this was probably a good idea and went back to watching his friend compete.

Aqua, during her playing, noticed Roxas and Xion amongst the crowd not too terribly far from where Ven and Terra were standing. It was hard to miss Roxas given his likeness to Ven. She made a mental note to go over and say hello to the two of them after her match was over. It was always a good thing to be friendly.

Aqua won the match (but not by much). She banished her Keyblade and gave a little bow to all of the people cheering for her. Then she made her way over to where Roxas and Xion were standing.

The two seemed a little bit surprised that Aqua went out of her way to come say hello to them, but after the initial pleasantries were exchanged, the surprise wore off.

"Where do you sign up for Fruitball!" Xion asked suddenly.

Aqua found herself smiling at Xion's enthusiasm.

"Right over there," she replied, pointing to the cat where she had signed up not all that long ago. "Are you two going to use your Keyblades?" she asked.

"Of course!" Xion replied emphatically. "This looks like _so _much fun!"

Aqua laughed. "It is!"

Roxas and Xion didn't need any more convincing. They turned to each other and with a grin, ran off to sign up. Aqua laughed to herself and went over to join Ven and Terra.

"You went over and said hi to Roxas and Xion, I see," Terra said.

Ven pouted. "Terra said that they were 'having a moment' and we shouldn't interrupt them. But then you went over there and got to talk to them and now they've run off."

"Oh don't pout," Aqua said. "It's unbecoming. They're only signing up to play Fruitball. We can stick around and watch their match. After that you can say hi!"

Ven smiled.

"Sheesh, so much complaining only to say hi," Terra teased.

Ven frowned, but didn't respond.

There was one match before Roxas and Xion. The match seemed to pass very quickly, for it wasn't too long before Roxas and Xion were up.

Each of them took their places and summoned their Keyblades.

"It's weird, sometimes," Ven said. "Seeing so many other people with Keyblades."

"What do you mean?" Aqua asked.

"Well, I hardly saw anyone but the two of you and the Masters with Keyblades on the Land of Departure," Ven said with a shrug. "And by the time Sora had a Keyblade, I was so far buried in his heart that I barely could pay attention if I wanted to." He shrugged. "I just think it's weird to see other people with Keyblades, that's all."

"I think it's very comforting to see young people with Keyblades," Aqua said, shrugging.

"Are you calling us old?" Terra asked.

Aqua shrugged. "I feel rather ageless, now that you mention it."

Terra paused, thinking about this. "I know what you mean."

Ven didn't put in his thoughts, he was too busy watching Roxas and Xion play against each other in a very riveting game.

Everyone thought Roxas had it when he scored seven points in a row with a grape fruitball. However, Xion managed to get in an apple _and _a banana at the very last minute and bring herself to the victory. They were very cordial with each other at the game's end, shaking hands and everything. Then they headed over to Ven, Terra and Aqua.

"Stellar game, guys!" Ven couldn't help himself from exclaiming as they walked up."

Roxas nodded, smiling slightly.

"Thanks," Xion said, smiling significantly more obviously.

"Where are you guys heading?" Terra asked.

"We don't know just yet," Roxas replied, shrugging.

"We were just going to grab a bite to eat," Ven offered. "There's this place that has pretty good chicken."

Terra and Aqua exchanged looks that clearly said that food had not been discussed. However, neither of them particularly cared. The ice cream felt like so long ago now after all of the activities since.

"We'll come along," Xion said.

She looked at Roxas, seeing if he minded.

"I could definitely eat after that game!" Roxas exclaimed.

"I know, right?" Ven asked.

"You didn't even play!" Aqua argued.

"Yeah, but watching all of you play made me hungry!" Ven argued.

Aqua and Terra both laughed. Roxas and Xion exchanged slightly confused looks, but didn't really question it. Without wasting too much more time, the five of them went to go get chicken. Ven knew exactly the place he was looking for, because he had smelled the chicken earlier. They each ordered a basket and a drink and settled down to eat.

"How have you two been?" Aqua asked.

"Pretty good," Xion said. "Life's been rather quiet on Destiny Islands, which is why we go out during the day to other worlds to help."

Roxas just nodded, his mouth too full of chicken to properly add anything.

"What about you?" Xion asked.

"Oh, just sealing Keyholes and stuff," Ven said. "We're… almost done?"

"There's still a few more left," Terra said. "But, we've got a path set out for us."

Xion nodded in understanding, gnawing on her chicken.

"Like I said, life's _really _been quiet for us," she said.

"How are those charms working out?" Aqua asked.

"Oh! Absolutely great! There's still a few we haven't even tried yet. But all the ones we have are absolutely great and they've been an excellent help on the battlefield. I _really _want to see what Wingblade looks like with Kairi and Namine. From what I hear, it's epic."

"Kairi and I used Diamond Dust," Roxas added, his mouth finally not completely full. "It came in a lot of handy with some Heartless in Olympus Coliseum."

"Excellent, I'm glad they're a help!"

Roxas and Xion grinned.

The five of them resumed their eating.

"Name's Axel, got it memorized?"

Roxas and Xion instantly whirled around. Axel wasn't hard to find, even if he for once wasn't wearing a cloak. He was talking to Max (who had extricated himself from the large party that included Sora and his father) and Roxanne (who had come over after Fruitball.)

"Axel!" Roxas exclaimed.

Axel's head turned to where Roxas was sitting. After seeing so many friends, he tipped his head to Max and Roxanne.

"I'll leave you two be," he said. "I've found who I was looking for."

"Sure thing!" Max said.

Roxanne waved.

Axel made his way over to the other five.

"Mind if I sit?" he asked.

Roxas and Xion scooted over on their bench to make room.

"Long time, no see," Ven said.

Axel shrugged. "You guys are off doing your thing and I'm off doing mine."

This was enough for Ven, but that didn't stop him from asking questions as to how Axel had been. Axel returned with questions of his own and in seemingly no time, everyone's food was finished. On top of that, Ven had a list going of things he now wanted to do.

"Did you happen to want any food?" Aqua asked. "I feel bad, we just ate and you didn't have anything."

"Nah, I'm full," Axel said, patting his stomach.

"Oh, well then. We better get going," Aqua replied. "Now that Ven's got a huge list of things he wants to do in his head."

"I still want to know _how _you plan on entering a noodle-eating contest after all that chicken you just ate," Terra said.

Ven grinned.

"Bottomless pit," Axel teased.

"Like you're one to talk!" Roxas teased, punching Axel on the shoulder.

Axel feigned pain and then waved to the other three. "Have fun!"

"Of course!" Ven said. "We're at the Million Dreams Festival. How could we not?"

They said their goodbyes and left.

"Seriously, though, how _do _you plan on entering a noodle-eating contest?" Terra asked.

"Well, if we do the other things I mentioned first," Ven said. "I should be hungry enough for it."

Terra didn't look too convinced.

"I almost wish Axel hadn't mentioned that event," Aqua muttered.

For, of course, it had been Axel to mention the noodle-eating contest.


	70. The Million Dreams Award

**Author's Note: **So... this is long. But... It's also the last chapter. That... kinda snuck up on me. (Both when I wrote the chapter originally, and now that I'm posting it.) I don't think I'm going to say too much. I do know that I have an answer for my Guest reviewer. The link to both of my blogs is on my profile here. So, check them out. Anyway, everyone enjoy this chapter. I'll save all of my thoughts and whatnot for the blog, AFTER you've read this.

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><p>"I'm game for a group hug."<p>

xx

Axel left the ice cream stand. He'd ordered something called 'Firehouse' because, it was supposed to be hot. The last time he'd done this, he'd ended up with cinnamon, so he was expecting something similar. But, you never knew. Why couldn't places besides Twilight Town sell sea-salt? Then the decision would be easy!

Sure enough, cinnamon. Oh well. He'd just have to go back for a different flavor later. He was bound and determined to get a new favorite flavor by the end of today. Or, a second-best favorite flavor after sea-salt.

He made his way around the festival, taking in the sights and sounds. He was half surprised he'd been invited at all. Sure, he and King Mickey knew each other, but he had no clue he was considered a 'friend.' Not that he was particularly complaining though, being a friend of the King certainly had benefits. (And Axel sure as heck didn't want to be _against _King Mickey.)

Try as he might, he just couldn't like cinnamon-flavored ice cream. Maybe he should stop ordering things boasting 'fiery' flavors. All he ended up with was cinnamon.

He went back to the ice cream stand and ordered Disney Town's Famous Fudge Chunk, purely because it was the longest name on the whole list. (Disney Town was actually part of the name.) It was pretty good, if you liked chocolate. Axel liked chocolate.

He was surprised when the old duck running the stand allowed him to fill out another slip for the drawing. Axel didn't care though. He would fill out as many slips as ice creams that he bought. (No telling how many those would be.) If he won, he'd try and create a fiery flavor that didn't involve cinnamon.

Which led him to think about how he could do that. What was fiery besides cinnamon? He started walking around again while he thought.

He passed the Rumble Racing and was pretty sure he saw Ven and Terra on the track. He didn't stop to watch though, he was _trying _to find Roxas and Xion. They'd left with the others rather early in the morning because they wanted to be at the festival all day. Axel had _intended _on doing such things… but then he decided that a nap had sounded really good.

He passed the noodle-eating contest and saw Sora and Riku and got excited. However, Roxas and Xion were not in the group, so he kept walking. When he found Roxas and Xion, he'd have to ask them if they had any thoughts for fiery ice cream. They might know…

He got distracted by the skate rink. He'd had a skateboard once, long ago. Not that he was about to skateboard now. Granted, he could potentially leave quite the legacy. But, he'd want his own board—which he lacked, so he kept walking.

He somehow found himself back at the ice cream place. Considering he'd finished the bowl of the chocolatey stuff, he might as well buy another bowl. He had plenty of munny and it wasn't like he was planning on eating _real _food.

He bought strawberry cheesecake for funsies. It wasn't half bad.

He walked past the skate rink again and was surprised to see Sora there. Where had Sora gotten the board from? More importantly, where had Sora learned to skateboard? He blinked, trying to figure this out. He scanned the crowd to see if Roxas or Xion were there, but they weren't. He kept walking, deciding he didn't want to see Sora get injured—an event that was bound to happen.

Where were Roxas and Xion? If he ran into Sora and the others again, he'd ask them.

He paused and watched a game of croquet. Mostly because the Queen was playing. Axel was rather fond of the Queen. She was a nice person. She didn't judge.

"Why hello, Axel!" she said when the game had finished.

"How'd you even know I was here?" Axel asked, slightly flabbergasted.

"You're hair! It's hard to miss!" the Queen laughed.

Axel patted his spikey hair and shrugged.

"You're all by your lonesome!" the Queen observed. "Where are your friends?"

"That's what I'm trying to figure out," Axel said, scratching his head. "I've been looking for Roxas and Xion this whole time and I can't find them."

The Queen frowned. "Well, I'm certainly sorry, Axel, but I have not seen them."

"S'all right," Axel said with a shrug. "I'll just keep looking."

"Good luck!"

"Thanks!"

Axel found himself once again at the ice cream stand.

"Would you like something else, me boy?" the old duck asked.

"Give me a bowl of whatever isn't selling well," Axel said.

"Ye sure like ice cream."

"Yup."

Axel was handed a bowl of vanilla ice cream and he handed over the appropriate amount of munny.

"Maybe I should start offerin' a discount," the duck mused.

"Nah, I'll pay full price," Axel said.

He left the shop after filling out the slip. By the time he'd finished that bowl of ice cream, he was seriously considering using his star shard to go to wherever the heck Roxas and Xion were. He was getting tired of walking.

Against his better judgment, he walked into the chicken place. He wasn't even hungry. But… oh he had no idea. He was just walking into the chicken place.

He saw a kid with a skateboard. Well, this could occupy his time for a bit.

"Nice skateboard you've got there," he said. Introductions could wait.

The kid looked up and nodded, grinning slightly. Axel couldn't help but notice that he looked a tad bit like Goofy. Maybe he was related or something.

"After I'm done eating, I'm going to go back to the rink. They're offering out prizes!"

Axel raised his eyebrows. Many of the games and stuff only offered ribbons and whatnot if you won from what he'd seen. Fruitball (since he'd walked past it several times) only offered you the satisfaction of winning.

"Max," the girl sitting with the boy (Max) whispered. "You haven't even introduced yourself!"

Max flushed. "I'm Max," he said, offering his hand out for Axel to shake. "And this is my girl, Roxanne."

Roxanne smiled and waved a little.

"Name's Axel," Axel said, grinning. "Got it memorized?"

Not two seconds later, Axel heard Roxas.

"Axel!"

So the chicken place had been a good idea after all. Perhaps Axel was attuned to Roxas' stomach being hungry or something. Sure enough, Roxas was sitting with Xion; as well as Aqua, Terra and Ven. Axel grinned even wider and turned back to Max and Roxanne. He nodded in their direction.

"I'll leave you two be," he said. "I've found who I was looking for."

"Sure thing!" Max said, completely not fazed by this.

"Have fun!" Roxanne said with a wave.

Axel sauntered off towards the others.

"Mind if I sit?" he asked.

Roxas and Xion were already making room for him on their bench.

"Long time, no see!" Ven said, holding up a chip in acknowledgement.

Axel shrugged. "You guys are off doing your thing and I'm off doing mine," he said.

Ven seemed to accept this as reason enough. Roxas and Xion asked Axel what he had been up to all day since they had yet to see him. Since he didn't want to outright admit that the only thing he'd really been doing was looking for them, he just mentioned everything he'd seen. Ven seemed particularly interested in the noodle-eating contest. He was also building a list of things he wanted to do later that afternoon.

"Did you happen to want any food?" Aqua asked, sounding guilty as she looked at her own empty basket. "I feel bad. We just ate and you didn't have anything. We didn't even offer you any food!"

"I'm full," Axel replied. He'd only had four ice creams. Well, three and a half, since he hadn't really finished the cinnamon one.

"Oh, okay then," Aqua said. "Well, we'd better get going. Especially now that Ven's got a huge list of things he wants to do in his head."

"I still want to know _how _you plan on entering a noodle-eating contest after all that chicken you just ate," Terra said, shaking his head.

Ven merely grinned.

"Bottomless pit," Axel coughed.

He was promptly punched on the shoulder by Roxas. He hadn't been prepared for that, he was expecting an elbow in the gut. Axel feigned pain to cover up for the actual pain and waved to cover that up.

"Have fun!" he said to the three people getting up.

"Of course!" Ven replied. "We're at the Million Dreams Festival. How could we not?"

"I can think of people who wouldn't have fun here," Terra muttered.

Axel made a face. He couldn't help it.

"Happy thoughts!" Aqua sang.

Everyone said their goodbyes, and like that, the party was split in half.

"Why didn't you mention that you were looking for us?" Xion asked.

"Who said I was?" Axel asked.

"It's obvious," Roxas said.

Axel shrugged. "You wanna go get dessert?"

"Didn't you say you were full?" Xion asked.

"Mostly just to make Aqua not feel bad. I could have some ice cream."

"We've already had ice cream," Xion said.

"And cotton candy," Roxas added.

"You can have as much ice cream as you want, though!" Axel exclaimed. "And you get to fill out one of those slips for every one you buy!"

"How would you know?" Xion asked, her brow furrowing.

Axel grinned.

"Well, I kinda wanna create my own flavor," Roxas said. "So let's go buy another round of ice cream. It can't hurt!"

Xion didn't really need too much convincing, so the three of them headed _back _to the ice cream place. Axel pretended not to notice that Roxas and Xion were holding hands the whole time.

Once they got there, Roxas ordered a berry fruit pop and Xion got raspberry ice cream dipped in chocolate. Axel saw something that intrigued him. It was called a Mickey Bar. Naturally, he ordered it.

"There is just something wrong about this," he said, observing the vanilla ice cream dipped in chocolate that was supposed to be in the shape of the King's head.

However, they didn't have too much time to speculate on it because it was now getting to be early evening and all of the awards and stuff from throughout the day were going to be announced. Everything from who ate the most noodles and had the highest score in Fruitball to the Million Dreams Award. Oh, and the people who got to design their own ice cream flavors were in there somewhere. Everyone gathered around the main stage as the people who ran the various booths and attractions announced winners. Axel, Roxas and Xion joined up with Sora and the others. Not too long after, Ven, Aqua and Terra found them. Somehow, they were in the front row. All of them waited to hear the winners.

Most of the awards were just certificates. However, the three best skaters in the skate rink each got gift cards of varying amounts to the skate shop in town. Aqua, very notably, won a trophy for having the highest score in Fruitball all day. The cat also announced that maybe next year, they'd have a proper Fruitball tournament with brackets and everything. Sora was rather depressed to learn that he had not eaten the most noodles. Riku gave him a solidarity pat on the shoulder. Axel laughed at that. Just, all of that.

After a bit, (too long, in many people's opinions) Scrooge McDuck walked up to draw names from the glass bowl he'd been keeping the slips in all day. The first name he pulled out was Ven.

"One shot in a million!" Ven shouted, pumping his fist in the air. He ran up to grab his voucher.

The second person was Donald Duck. He was immediately thereafter plagued by his three nephews to give up the creation of a new flavor to one of them. They all were complaining that since he hadn't technically bought a flavor for himself, and only a bowl for each of them, the ice-cream-flavor-making right technically belonged to one of them since they were the ones that consumed the ice cream. Donald, however, wasn't backing down on accepting the award for himself. He had paid for the ice cream and he was going to accept this award. Besides, there was no telling which one of the purchased ice creams the slip was from, so he should just get it anyway. Axel found the logic rather sound. After receiving his award, Donald stayed towards the front, away from his nephews.

The third name Scrooge called was Axel.

"Not surprised, considering how much ice cream you must've bought," Xion said.

"It was only five," Axel said, grinning as he went up to accept the voucher. "Fiery ice cream. What does fire taste like?"

He was still contemplating this when the winner of the Million Dreams Award was announced. Axel had heard the award being talked about in his massive amounts of walking around the festival, but he hadn't stopped to nominate anyone. Who would he nominate that fit the bill?

To everyone's surprise (especially Queen Minnie, who was reading out the award) it was Queen Minnie who won.

"But… who would nominate me?" she asked, her voice small.

A _lot _of people in the crowd raised their hands, even though Axel was pretty sure they weren't allowed to admit it.

"You were so courteous during croquet!" someone called out.

"You helped me find my daughter!" someone else called.

"You're an awesome friend!" Lady Daisy (Axel knew that one) said.

Queen Minnie flushed brighter and brighter red with each person's announcement.

"You're my wife; of course I'd nominate you."

King Mickey's voice resonated louder than anyone else's in the crowd. Axel found himself searching the crowd for the King. He hadn't seen him once all day. And Axel was pretty sure he'd seen _everyone _in all of his walking.

From the murmurings he was hearing from Sora, Kairi and Namine, he would guess that several people had not seen the King all day.

Mickey came onto the stage from under the back curtain. Minnie turned to him and smiled. It was a smile that, ordinarily, would have made Axel puke. But because the King and Queen were who they were, he figured it was allowed.

"Who d'ya nominate?" the King asked, almost sheepishly. "If you're allowed to say."

"I didn't nominate anybody!" the Queen replied. "I don't think it would be fair since I run the whole thing. Though, if I did nominate anyone, it would be you, for being such a good King."

King Mickey flushed. "Your vote is the only one I care about."

The whole audience was just dying with all the cuteness. Many people were "ooh"ing and "aww"ing. (Mostly the latter.) Axel couldn't help but notice that Namine and Riku had joined hands. Sora had his arm around Kairi. Xion was resting her head on Roxas' arm, their hands linked as well. And, if he wasn't mistaken, Aqua and Terra were standing rather close, though no one noticed. Though Axel was totally cool with the uber cuteness that was happening on the stage, he would puke a little at all the cuteness happening all around him. He looked back up at the stage pointedly, his eye twitching.

"Ahem," Goofy said, stepping forward. "The Million Dreams Award still needs to be presentified!"

He was holding, what appeared to be a bowl of ice cream.

"Normally, Queen Minnie presents it to the winner. Today, though, I think King Mickey should presentify it! 'Cause I sure ain't gonna do it! I'm too bashful!"

He handed the bowl of what was most certainly ice cream to the King.

King Mickey took it and in turn, presented it to Queen Minnie.

As much as Axel hated to admit it, it was the most adorable thing in the world.

For a brief second, he almost wished he had someone here to share this moment with. He thought about Kuin for a second, but pushed that thought away. Whatever he and Kuin had, it wasn't something like this. This was the kind of moment that you shared with people who'd been to hell and back with you. All of those people (save for one) were here right now. Maybe one day, Kuin would be among those people, but not right now. He jabbed both Roxas and Xion in the ribs.

"How about enough mushy stuff and just one big group hug," he said.

"I thought you didn't like hugging," Roxas said, looking up at him kind of skeptically.

"Shut up," Axel said.

"I'm game for a group hug," Sora said, turning around.

Kairi was the one to actually start said group hug and in no time, Axel found himself squished between everyone he considered friends. Donald surprisingly joined them, so did Goofy, who came down from the stage to do so. Max and Roxanne joined in, though Axel had no idea why. Donald's nephews even came over to share the love.

What was most surprising though, was when the King and Queen came and joined in as well.

And in that moment, there was peace and happiness.


	71. La Pace

**Author's Note: **Welp, this is the last chapter, guys. Technically, it's just an epilogue. But, tis important. Well... not even that. This character needed a cameo so it happened. But, this is the end. For reals this time guys. But! Never fear! Keep an eye out on the blog! And... rar keeps pestering me about that one thingy I'm supposed to be doing for Can't Escape... but... novel... gimme a few days. So... yeah... I'm gonna stop rambling now.

* * *

><p>"Would you like anything else, sir?"<p>

xx

The beach was not too particularly crowded today, despite it being nearing mid-summer. However, for whatever reason, the beach wasn't crowded.

For one particular person, this was a very peachy thing. It wasn't like he was antisocial or anything, he just didn't want to be surrounded by people. He found it hard to relate.

He appeared to be at the beach for tanning purposes, for he was rather pale. He wore sunglasses that covered half his face and his hair up in a ponytail. A scar cut across his face, but it was an old scar. Such things weren't terribly common on this World, but there were heroes of wars and whatnot. The man wore simple black swim trunks and carried a bag with the necessary beach supplies: sun lotion, a towel, a newspaper.

He passed the cantina and ordered a mojito, only to be deeply saddened to hear that that particular drink was not served. He ordered a mimosa instead. He then took a seat in a chair under a palm tree and reclined back, flipping open his newspaper, scanning through the articles.

"Million Dreams Festival, eh?" he murmured.

"Why yes, sir," said the waiter who brought his mimosa. "However could you miss it? The Festival was just yesterday. I would imagine that is why the beach is quiet today, everyone is tired from the festivities. There was quite the shock when the Queen herself won the Million Dreams Award that somehow prompted a giant group hug just in front of the stage."

The man snorted. "Well, I confess I wasn't around," he said with a shrug.

The waiter merely bowed his head, not one to ask personal questions. He simply asked if the man would like anything else and when the answer was no, he left extra napkins and went back to the cantina shack.

The man continued to peruse the newspaper, but didn't find anything particularly interesting, it would seem.

"I wonder if the King knows I'm right under his nose," he murmured to himself, sipping on his mimosa. "I wonder if he cares."

He wasn't entirely sure what he was doing, sneaking around King Mickey's domain. He wasn't trying to fight anybody, he hardly was trying to gather information. If he had to pick the thing that whatever it was he was doing was closest to, it was toeing the line to see if he would get caught.

Before, he always knew the limits. Now he had none. He was free to do whatever he pleased. Given his laidback nature, he was rather all right with that. But his instincts for certain things made him itchy.

He'd tried to ignore all of said instincts as he wanted to spend a day on the beach. Now, there were plenty of beaches that he could have gone to, especially on Worlds that were _known _for their beaches: such as Destiny Islands or Hawaii, or even Twilight Town, which had a particularly nice beach.

But he wanted to go to a beach that was quieter, on a world where he wouldn't be immediately be pegged as an outsider. Destiny Islands was a world that was only _recently _learning of the outside worlds, and even then, most turned a blind eye. But there were enough people there who would recognize him for what he was and he would not be welcome there. Hawaii was transient enough, but _so _far away and _so _much effort to get there. Twilight Town had a habit of only noticing differences when the differences stood out. But, there was a high chance of him running into people that he just didn't want to see.

Disney Town seemed in particular to be a good choice once all those things were factored in. Here, people milled in and out and most people there knew of other worlds. The people were known to be accustomed to travelers. He figured he wouldn't be picked out from the crowd, which was something he didn't want. It wasn't like he had the greatest of track records. In fact, he'd reckon if the King saw him right now, he'd probably end up getting in a pretty nasty fight. Such was his life. He'd lost all shots of redemption. Whatever.

He sighed. Partially because of his thoughts and partially because his mimosa was gone.

His instincts and old habits were itching for him to get up and _do _something, but he denied them. He forced himself to relax and then fall asleep.

He woke up several hours later, judging by the sun's position in the sky above. The waiter had seen fit to clear the little table sitting next to his chair.

"Would you like anything else, sir?" he asked. "Another mimosa, perhaps?"

"Nah," he replied. "I'm good."

The waiter nodded his head and left, leaving the man once again with his thoughts.

It had been about a month now. A month since he'd been on his own. He'd travelled from World to World, killing Heartless here and there to keep his munny stock intact. He missed the steady income and protection of his old job. That job was long gone and wouldn't—_couldn't_—be coming back. If it did, he'd seriously consider turning it down, considering the lengths said boss would have to have gone through to start the job up again.

He was having a mid-life crisis of sorts. He really had no idea what he was doing with whatever remained (and he could never be sure how much that was) of his life. Was he good? Was he evil?

He was too proud to outright join the side of people that he used to be against. But what if he just became neutral? Some sort of chaotic neutral that did whatever he felt like? No, too much like someone _else _that he used to work for. Besides, he didn't want to be _neutral, _that was too boring. Maybe he should just be a tad chaotic. Chaos was fun.

Ack. Enough existential talk. He either needed to take another nap, or put on some real clothes and go retrieve some things from a world that was rumored to be falling into the darkness.

Which, ironically, was partially his fault.

He laughed. There were reasons why he was like this.

He just needed to run into some old friends of his and play a game of cat and mouse. That would make him feel better. Especially if he was the cat. He liked being the cat. He had enough old friends to cause some ruckus.

He leaned back in his chair for the moment though, resting his head on his hands. Eh, he had time, he had plenty of time. Maybe he should wait for something else to cause a ruckus first, then he'd join in on the fun. That seemed like a good idea.

Right now, maybe he was fine just… doing nothing.


End file.
